The growth of a design : Frank O'Connor's story cycles

Criticism on Frank O'Connor's short fiction since his death in 1966 generally draws upon a nucleus of assumptions--that the Irish storyteller's thematic interests take precedence over formal ones, that his style belongs to the realistic tradition of an earlier age, and that the themes themselves belong to a modern romantic tradition. By characterizing O'Connor as a realist in style and as a romantic in theme his critics are able to reconcile some of O'Connor's own claims to be a realist and a romantic, a liberal and a conservative, a reactionary and a writer in the vanguard of the newest literary developments.