E-books

The Lilliput Press, the distinguished Dublin publisher known for its new works of Irish fiction and history as well as limited editions and handsome reprints of Irish classics by Joyce, Kavanagh and other giants, has embarked on an ambitious publishing program, issuing
e-books of six J.P. Donleavy titles with plans to issue three more in the coming months.

Lilliput draws from Donleavy’s best-seller list and his backlist, offering an intriguing assortment of fiction and non-fiction, and bit of sociology and some journalism. Each book stands on its own merits. Collectively the works demonstrate Donleavy’s range and skill in different genres, all written in the classic Donleavy style.

e-Donleavy

Donleavy e-books now available in The Lilliput Press series are (with year of initial publication in parenthesis):

The Beastly Beatitudes of Balthazar B (1968). Donleavy’s third novel has
never been out of print. BBBB is unlike other Donleavy novels in that it is
a romance with a strong, serious female lead, Elizabeth Fitzdare,
Balthazar’s love.

The History of The Ginger Man (1994). Seymour Lawrence encouraged Donleavy to do The History. It’s the author’s compelling account of writing TGM, the rejections that followed, Brendan Behan’s directing him to The Olympia Press, the 1955 publication by Maurice Girodias in the Traveller’s Companion Series and the 21-year legal battle between Girodias and Donleavy that ensued.

Meet My Maker The Mad Molecule (1964). Here collected are Donleavy’s earliest short pieces, a mix of short stories and sketches. Included is the first Donleavy writing ever published, “Party On Saturday Night,” a short story that appeared in a 1950 issue of John Ryan’s literary journal Envoy: A Review of Literature & Art.

The Saddest Summer of Samuel S (1966). The novella’s title character is an American undergoing psychoanalysis in Vienna. Herr S, who even exasperates his doctor, thinks too much and dispenses blunt opinions in his lonely battle for survival of the spirit.

A Singular Country (1989). The novelist turns reporter and social critic as he explores his adopted country Ireland in the early years of the Celtic Tiger boom, finding bijou bungalow blight.

An Author and His Image (1997). This second collection of short pieces, published in England but never available in the United States – until now,
includes essays, profiles and sports pieces from British and U.S. periodicals
from 1976 to 1996.

Loyal Readers and a New Generation

“These and the subsequent Donleavy titles will be welcomed by loyal readers seeking the mobility and convenience of the e-format while introducing Donleavy to new readers from the computer generation,” Antony Farrell, Lilliput Press founder and publisher, told the J.P. Donleavy Compendium.

At Lilliput’s Dublin offices for the October launch of these e-books, reporters from Ireland’s radio and TV broadcaster RTÉ interviewed both Farrell and Donleavy about the digital revolution and its impact on publishing.

Farrell told RTÉ that the bound book will remain “vital. It is the mother of what’s represented on the screen.” But the e-format enables instantaneous distribution worldwide and the ability of the reader to “carry 100 books in your pocket.”

Said Donleavy: “The more the works – any author’s work – can be available is a benefit for both the work and the author himself.”

(The broadcast report by reporter Sinead Crowley can be heard at the RTÉ Radio 1 website http://www.rte.ie/news/morningireland/player.html?20111027,3092921,3092921,flash,257, beginning at 43 minutes into the program).

More e-Donleavy

In the coming months, Lilliput will release e-book editions of three more
Donleavy classics (year of original publication in parenthesis):

The Onion Eaters (1971). This is the first of the author’s Irish big-house
novels. Clayton Claw Cleever Clementine inherits Charnel Castle,
calamity and uninvited guests.

The Unexpurgated Code: A Complete Manual of Survival & Manners (1975).
The satiric self-help book dishes out etiquette and self-defense advice not to
be found in Debrett’s or Emily Post. It’s the first volume to be illustrated by
the author.

Wrong Information Is Being Given Out at Princeton (1998). This later novel set largely in Manhattan after World War II is classic Donleavy. Struggling composer Alfonso Stephen O’Kelly’O marries beautiful heiress Sylvia Triumphington and discovers the rich are different but not immune to tragedy or wrong information.

Remembering Bohemian Dublin

Also of interest to Donleavy readers and available now from Lilliput as an e-book as well as a paperback is Remembering How We Stood: Bohemian Dublin at Mid-Century, the memoir by John Ryan.

The legendary Ryan was a painter, arts patron, editor and publisher as well as a publican. Not only was he first to publish Donleavy and encouraged him to paint, Ryan was a patron of Patrick Kavanagh, Brian O’Nolan and Brendan Behan and an advocate for James Joyce at a time when Ireland wanted to forget Joyce. In 1954, on June 16, Ryan, Kavanagh, and a few others made a pilgrimage to Dublin’s Mortello Tower where Joyce briefly lived to hold the first Bloomsday celebration of Joyce. They later adjourned to The Bailey, the literary pub owned by Ryan.

Ryan’s eyewitness account of Dublin’s literary renaissance and the aspiring and competitive writers who made it happen, was first published in 1975 in Ireland by Gill & Macmillan
and in the U.S. by Taplinger. Lilliput republished the classic as a paperback, first in 1987 and many times since, with the addition of a foreword by Donleavy that also appears in
the e-book.

Compatibility and Contact

For contractual reasons, Lilliput’s BBBB will be marketed in Europe and elsewhere outside the U.S. All their other Donleavy titles will be marketed worldwide. Lilliput’s e-books are compatible with the major hand-held readers, such as Amazon’s Kindle, Barnes & Noble’s Nook and Sony’s Reader.

Lilliput e-books can be purchased directly at the publisher’s website, www.lilliputpress.ie. Lilliput’s 2011-2012 catalogue can also be viewed online, www.issuu.com/thelilliputpress/docs/lilliput_press_catalogue.

The Donleavy e-books as well as other Lilliput titles will eventually be available through other websites of major book and e-content retailers and distributors around the world, including Apple, Baker and Taylor, Copia, Ebooks.com, Ebrary, EBSCO, FirstyFish, Follett, Gardners, Global Mediavault, Google eBooks, Ingram, iTunes, Jonathan Ball, Kobo, Libri, OLF, On the Dot, OverDrive, Publidisa, Txtr, Waterstones and Zinio,

Lilliput’s e-book venture is a partnership with Faber Factory in the U.K. and is supported by the Arts Council of Ireland.

In addition to Lilliput’s Donleavy e-books, several best-selling Donleavy books, including The Ginger Man, are also available in the U.S. as e-books from the New York publisher Grove Atlantic. In England and elsewhere, e-books of The Ginger Man and The Lady Who Liked Clean Rest Rooms will be available from Little, Brown Book Group Ltd.