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In the Foul Rag-and-Bone Shop
Published by
Scotus Press, Dublin, 2023.
This playfully philosophical novel tackles the major issues of our time: money, power, identity, celebrity, art, the nature of civilisation. With a galaxy of quirky characters, the plot twists and turns unpredictably like a beached eel, always with ironic overtones.
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Available online from Scotus Press
www.scotuspress.com
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Reflection in a Tar-Barrel (2023 edition)
Published by
Scotus Press, Dublin, 2023.
Set in the Mid-Seventies, this novel explores the world through the eyes of an eccentric young man, Lofty, and follows his journey of exploration from the West of Ireland to Paris and Lourdes. The relationship he strikes up with a sex worker on the streets of Paris leads back to the woman-starved West of Ireland where Lofty now combines the roles of hawker in religious goods and keeper of a mobile brothel. Events accelerate with accumulating menace and hurtle towards disaster.
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Available online from Scotus Press
www.scotuspress.com
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Uneasy Bedfellows
Published by
Scotus Press, Dublin, 2023.
Two young friends who have bonded through poetry join an expedition to Derry on the fateful August weeken in 1969 when the history of Northern Ireland took a violent turn.
Their bus encountered the barbarism before it even crossed the Border. The incident coloured the rest of their lives, and left them with the fraught dilemna as to whether they should dedicate themselves to Culture or to Civilisation, two diametrically opposed objectives.
The teaching profession and the cause of secular education provide some common ground, but they have a long struggle to find balance and harmony in their lives.
Available online from Scotus Press
www.scotuspress.com
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In the Wake of the Bagger
Published by
Scotus Press, Dublin, 2023.
Scotus Press have published a new edition of Harte's acclaimed first novel, In the wake of the Bagger.
Des Kenny selected Harte's In the Wake of the Bagger as one of the 101 Irish Books You Must Read, in his book of that name.
He was not the only one to heap praise on it: The Sunday Business Post called it a 'many-splendored thing', and the Irish Independent declared it to be 'one of the great books about Ireland'.
Available online from Scotus Press
www.scotuspress.com
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The Laughing Boy
Published by
Scotus Press, Dublin, 2021.
The Laughing Boy was given its first stage production at The New Theatre, Dublin, from 31st August to 11th September, 2021.
It returned on 1st March 2022 by public demand for a further 2-week run, and on the 1st September 2022, it travelled to London for performances at the Irish Cultural Centre, Hammersmith.
Dublin 1963 and Brendan Behan’s song The Laughing Boy has become the inspirational anthem of the political Left in Greece. Alexandra, a student and political activist, has travelled here to seek out the writer of the song and invite him to Greece to boost the struggle for Socialism.
Her search comes to an end in a Dublin pub but what she finds there is strange in the extreme. This is not the Brendan Behan she was expecting. In fact she is totally bewildered when two characters claim to be Brendan Behan, each with a different take on the legendary writer.
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Available online from Scotus Press
www.scotuspress.com
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Two Plays
Published by
Scotus Press, Dublin, 2020.
This volume provides the texts of two of Jack Harte’s plays that have enjoyed very successful runs in Dublin theatres, The Mysterious History of Things and Killing Grandad.
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Available online from Scotus Press
www.scotuspress.com
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Reflections in a Tar Barrel (Bilingual English / Russian edition),
Published by
Direct Media, Moscow, 2021.
A novel of mystique that tells the story of a
young man with a learning disability but with a richly endowed capacity
for mystical speculation.
Awarded the Valentin Krustev Award for Translation 2021 by the William Meredith Foundation, USA
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more
Available online from Direct Media
www.directmedia.ru
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Rehabilitating the Serpent
Published by
Scotus Press, Dublin, 2017.
Religion inspires love and hatred in equal measure. Intrigued by these paradoxes, Jack Harte analyses religions back to their origins in story, through the medium of narrative itself, and challenges the notions of good and evil on which they are based. He confronts the ultimate Boogey Man, the Devil, the Serpent.
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Available online from Scotus Press
www.scotuspress.com
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Language of the Mute
Published by
Scotus Press, Dublin, 2015. This play was given its premiere at the New Theatre, Dublin, from 24 August to 5 September, 2015:
A charismatic teacher, a supporter of fundamentalist republicanism and Irish Language activist – whose overt and very public idealism masks a history of sexual and psychological exploitation – is confronted by his former pupils. The play examines how charisma and idealism can be used to exploit people, sexually, politically and socially. The core of the problem and the core of the solution is language and communication. But the play shows how ultimately love can triumph over cynicism, how idealism can endure.
Available online from Scotus Press
www.scotuspress.com
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Arcana
Jack Harte's book, Arcana, was published on the Internet as an international UNESCO World Book Night event on 23 April, 2013. It was presented in eight languages and the event was live streamed by the online magazine Breac based in Notre Dame University in the US. While the main event took place in the Irish Writers' Centre in Dublin, the translators joined in from locations around the world from Mexico to China.
In the style of the heroic sagas, but with anti-heroic intent, it challenges inherited concepts of heroism and religion. With a light and lively touch it demonstrates how a religion or philosophy is hijacked by power-mongers.
Available to read for free online from
www.scotuspress.com with translations on breac.nd.edu
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Arcana (Spanish edition)
Published by
Scotus Press, Dublin, 2014. Linares International Literature Festival featured Arcana and invited Harte to present it at the Festival in November 2013. They commissioned a print edition of the book in Spanish especially for the Festival.
Available online from Scotus Press
www.scotuspress.com
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Unravelling the Spiral - The Life and Work of Fred Conlon (1943-2005)
Published by
Scotus Press, Dublin, 2010. In this book Harte warmly tells the remarkable story of the life of sculptor Fred Conlon and provides a unique insight into his ideas and inspiration.
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Available online from Scotus Press
www.scotuspress.com
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In the Wake of the Bagger (Bulgarian translation)
Published by Altera Publishing House, Sofia, 2010
(Bulgarian translation by Vergil Nemchev). A Bulgarian translation of this first novel by the master storyteller, which has
been acclaimed as 'one of the great books about Ireland'.
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Reflections in a Tar Barrel (Bulgarian
translation)
Published by Altera Publishing House, Sofia, 2007
(Bulgarian translation by Vergil Nemchev). This translation of Jack
Harte's latest novel was an outstanding success in Bulgaria.
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From Under Gogol's Nose
Published by
Voskresenye Publishing House, Moscow, 2007 (Russian translation by Katia
Pryakhin). This Russian version of the story collection was launched at
the Moscow International Book Fair, and promoted at the annual
commemoration of the story-writer, Alexander Kuprin.
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Dream of a Pyramid
Published by Rajkamal
Prakashan, New Delhi, 2006. This translation of a selection of Harte’s
stories into Hindi was launched by the Irish Ambassador, His Excellency
Kieran Dowling, at the India International Centre in September, 2006.
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Lament for the Birds
Published by Scotus
Press, 2004. This CD of stories and songs, thematically structured and
integrated, features the author reading some of his stories set in his
native Sligo, and Sligo singer/musician, Carmel Gunning, singing his
lyrics and playing the traditional airs to which the songs were set.
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more
Available online from Scotus Press
www.scotuspress.com
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And Here I Am by Lyubomir Levchev (translated by Jack
Harte)
Published by Dedalus Press, 2003. This is Jack Harte's
acclaimed translation of some of the work of the world-renowned Bulgarian
poet.
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Birds and Selected Stories
Published by
Orpheus Publishing House, Sofia, Bulgaria, 2001 (Bulgarian translation by
Vergil Nemchev). After the publication of Birds and Other Stories
Harte acquired a substantial and appreciative readership in Bulgaria.
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Birds and Other Tails
Published by Dedalus
Press, 1996. An outstanding follow-up to Murphy in the Underworld,
this collection of stories features some of Harte's most impressive
writing.
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Homage
Published by Dedalus Press, 1992. A
Novella. Three artists, a poet, a sculptor, and a traditional musician,
come together by chance in a cottage in the country during the summer. The
challenge is thrown down: each artist is to produce an original work to
win the affection (and the body) of the young woman who is with them. The
rivalries are acute, the characters real and individual; a battle royal
begins …
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Murphy in the Underworld
Published by
Glendale Press, 1986. Harte's debut collection was acclaimed as 'one of
the most important story collections for some time'. Murphy in the
Underworld heralded the arrival of one of the most exciting voices in
Irish writing, and introduced us to some of Harte's most memorable
stories.
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