Early Irish Lyrics, edited by Gerald Murphy, Oxford at the Clarendon, Press, 1956

If I could save only two books from the conflagration, this would be one of them. (The other is not the Bible.).

Murphy knew and loved this literature (as I do, so I am prejudiced). He gives a good selection with full scholarly apparatus. The vocabulary can teach you a lot about Early Irish. The translations are EXCELLANT. The old Oxford Press edition is solid enough that it might make it through a conflagration without any help from me.

Tales of the Fairies and of the Ghost World collected from oral tradition in southwest Munster by Jeremiah Curtin, The Talbot Press, 1973

These short stories are real people in 1890s Ireland (when people dealt every day with the world as it is and never saw a computer) telling about things that happened to them or to others in the community, in their own time or before. The stories are fascinating and well-told with the Munster directness. Not every modern reader will appreciate that or the lack of filtering and fluff, but some will.

The Wild Plant Solution, Guido Mase, Healing Arts Press, 2013

There are lots of books about herbs and herbalism, but this one is remarkable for combining clear description of the scientific bases for the use of aromatic, butter and tonic herbs, with eloquent, knowledgeable and evident long personal knowledge and affection for these 15 plants. I wish there were more like this book.

Guido (and Rosemary Gladstar, of course) are the Eliot Colemans of Herbalism, and that is high praise.

Eigse Chairbre, Blathnaid Ui Chathain, an Clochomhar, 2006

The author skillfully shows the reader a world that is unfortunately lost and lets us hear forgotten voices.

She has gone through all the manuscripts and gathered songs and poems made in the area of County Cork extending from roughly Timoleague to Drimoleague/Bantry, gathered information on the makers, supplied notes and vocabulary, 533 pages' worth. It is great. (No English translations though).

Irish 18th century poetry, by the way, is also great. Not every poem here is among the best, but all are good.

Billy Butter, Berta and Elmer Hader, MacMillan, 1936

A kid's book from the 1930s? Really? I mean the cadence is simple and declarative and the story is told in third person, and it's about an actual goat: the title is not ironic or anything.

Well, it comes down to the person(s) who wrote the book. The Haders were good souls and good skillful writers and it sounds like they made a little oasis beside the river in years oases were pretty scarce. They had a wide experience of early 20th century America and sympathy for people. The story mostly occurs on Telegraph Hill, San Francisco, then an almost self-governing working class village within the city, and the story takes hard stuff about life and life for the un-wealthy for granted: stuff that now only shows up in diatribes, if ever. An understated, fond humor permeates the book. The illustrations are great.

I'm still at a loss to explain why I like this book a lot. Maybe partly it's just that I've grown to appreciate straightforward tales by authors who love people, animals and the world, and who have taken the time to learn their craft.

Born for Love: Why Empathy Is Essential...and Endangered, Maia Szala vitz and Bruce D. Perry, William Morrow, 2010

Well written, eloquent and an easy read. An important book. There sure are a lot of people today who need to ponder these topics. I really doubt they will, which is a great shame, but we are probably too far down the chute for that to make a difference anywa

Literature in Irish, Proinsias MacCana, Department of Foreign Affairs (Ireland), 1980

A short book written by still the best and wisest and most discerning of Irish language scholars. Still the best book on the topic, as well.

Ainm.ie

started as a series of books, but is now a website on which you can find well-researched and written biographies of maybe a thousand words of most of the men and women associated in any way with literature in Irish since about 1550. It is in Irish, and excellent Irish, which I suppose is not surprising, given that a Cork man and woman were behind the whole thing, not some committee of academics.