Eileen Battersby

Eileen Battersby

Literary Correspondent

Eileen Battersby is an Irish Times staff journalist and our literary correspondent. She has written about all aspects of the arts, particularly classical music and literature, as well as archaeology, historical geography and architectural history and has championed fiction in translation.

Four times winner of the Arts Journalist of the Year award, she has most recently won the Critic of the Year and has published two books; Second Readings and Ordinary Dogs.

All That Is, by James Salter

Sex is a battlefield in the octogenarian American writer’s new novel

An Englishman in Madrid, by Eduardo Mendoza

The 2010 winner of the €601,000 Planeta prize is an entertaining but forgettable burlesque set in civil war Madrid

Constance, by Patrick McGrath

Its author’s familiar preoccupations – sexual obsession, emotional trauma, destructive relationships – feature in his slight new (...)

Asunder, by Chloe Aridjis

Eileen Battersby finds the Mexican-American writer’s second novel chillier than her first

Nothing Gold Can Stay by Ron Rash

There’s precious little gold in this new book of short stories by the gifted Appalachian-based poet and storyteller Ron Rash

Levels of Life, by Julian Barnes

The English novelist’s non-fiction account of his grief following the death of his wife is brave, moving and heartfelt

Home Fires, by Elizabeth Day

Kinship ties end up in a claustrophobic knot in Day’s impressive second novel

Brief Loves That Life Forever, by Andrei Makine

From fear to frustrated idealism, aspects of Soviet life are recalled by a watchful narrator

Underground Time, by Delphine de Vigan, translated by George Miller

This Impac-listed novel about a bullied office worker will strike a chord if you’ve ever been the victim of workplace back-stabbin(...)

More articles

Latest

Malmö in party mode ahead of Eurovision final
Rooney’s future not my problem, says Ferguson
Armed groups bomb Libyan military posts
O’Gara’s Racing Metro move a surprise to Sexton
Man arrested over Dublin gun attack
Ross O'Carroll-Kelly 'We had a peace summit in the Fu King Northside restaurant'
 

Connect



Popular

We don’t need no high-cost, high-brow, heavy metal education
O’Gara’s Racing Metro move a surprise to Sexton
‘I think so much talent is wasted in France’ – Mehrtens
Ireland might be wise to look more closely at Google
Wallace accuses Shatter of trying to discredit him

Galleries

Toulon fans before the Heineken Cup final against Clermont Auvergn. Photograph: James Crombie/Inpho The French rugby invasion
Custom House Quay funfair for St Patrick's Weekend. Photograph: Bryan O'Brien Dublin through a lens - Irish Times photographers and the city as they see it

Blogs

Cannes Review of Jimmy P

Arnaud Desplechin stumbles with his first film in the English language
home_delivery_300x120
pagesales_300x120
Rewarding Times Buy now for €289 Rewarding Times Buy now for €289

Offer closed: Save €311 on a two-night stay at the five-star Lyrath Estate Hotel.

Register your team now Register your team now

The Irish Times/Allianz Fantasy Golf game. Over €15,000 to be won

eircom Business Centre eircom Business Centre

Latest blog post: What do your customers really want?

Select for slide 1 Select for slide 2 Select for slide 3
Photo Sales Photo Sales

Choose from an extensive range of photographs taken by Irish Times photographers

epaper_300x120