Sir, - In her review of the biography of Mary Lavin (Books, July 18th), Evelyn Conlon asks a question: "Where did she get the courage to write against the tide of her colleagues, one of whom, Frank O'Connor, lamented that she had written only one story from a patriotic point of view and one was enough."
Not only does Conlon misquote and fail to provide the context, she also completely misses the point that O'Connor was making. His exact words are: "An Irishman, reading the stories of Mary Lavin, is actually more at a loss than a foreigner would be. His not-so-distant political revolution, seen through her eyes, practically disappears from view. She has written only one story about it - The Patriot Son - and from a patriotic point of view that is more than enough."
In fact, O'Connor believed that Mary Lavin brought a whole new perspective to the Irish short story. He emphasised that "all through Mary Lavin's stories one is aware of a certain difference in values". And he added: "In her later stories there is an authenticity and solidity that makes the work of most Irish writers seem shadowy." These quotations, and the admission that "she fascinated me more than any other of the Irish writers of my generation" are from his book The Lonely Voice, in which he devotes most of a chapter to her work. Perhaps there were other of her colleagues who dismissed her work, but Frank O'Connor was most definitely not one of them. - Yours, etc., Harriet O'Donovan Sheehy
The Green Road, Dalkey, Co Dublin.