The Leavetaking - Softcover

(On his last day at school a teacher considers the events which have led to his present crisis: he has been dismissed from his job because he is 'living in sin'. Neighbours and employers can only regard his registry office marriage to an American divorcee as immoral, for this is Ireland. Patrick Moran looks back on an Irish childhood, learning his Catechism at the sickbed of his dying mother and suffering the harshness of his policeman father; and on an Irish youth, cloistered at a Catholic training school but still able to experience the thrills and bewilderments of a sexual education. This is the past he reviews before taking his leave of it.
John McGahern, one of Ireland's most brilliant talents, has in his latest novel produced a work of rare insight, beauty and sensitivity about a man's past and his attempt to unshackle himself from it.
'Thrilling and memorable' SundayTimes
'McGahern writes so beautifully that he
leaves one in no doubt of his equality with Joyce'
Encounter

'A beautiful, irresistible work of imagination'
Sunday Telegraph)