The case of the missing women

Remember the proposed Field Day Anthology Of Irish Women's Writing? And the hoo-ha when the original Field Day anthology came out in 1991, and the female half of the nation was found to be seriously under-represented? The American publishers, Norton, commissioned an editorial panel to put together a volume to redress the balance, and work began five years ago. Many of the "sub-editors", some of whom filed their sections four years ago, have been wondering aloud if the project is alive or dead. It is, counters one of the editors, Gerardine Meaney of UCD, very much alive, and a final version has recently gone to the publishers; she expects it will be published in about a year's time.

She explains the delay was due to the difficulty of the research on the early period. The time-lag then meant the more contemporary elements had to be updated. She attributes the frustration some editors feel to "a lack of understanding of the problems of people working on the early periods".