Description

Dublin, 1939. Dónal returns from his Rhine honeymoon certain of two things, that he has married the woman he loves, and that his life as a writer is about to begin.

Instead, as Europe slips into war, his world begins to fracture, quietly at first, then all at once.

In their Rathmines flat, small irritations harden into fault lines. A picture moved on a wall becomes a symbol of everything shifting out of place. Eileen’s patience thins, Dónal’s ambitions falter. Money is tight, pride tighter. Old desires resurface when Emer O’Brien re-enters his life, and what was once a marriage of promise turns into a battleground of resentment, silence, and longing. Even distance offers no relief. When Dónal goes west to Connemara, the space between them only sharpens what has already been broken.

First published in 1946, Tonn Tuile (Flood Tide) by Séamus Ó Néill, now vividly translated by his daughter, Eithne O’Neill, is a sharp, darkly humorous portrait of love under pressure. Capturing the essence of a neutral Ireland caught in the shadow of war, as politics, identity and private lives collide.

Wry, unsentimental and quietly devastating, this is a novel about the slow erosion of intimacy, the fragile ego of the artist, and the dangerous stories we tell ourselves about who we are, and who we might yet become.

The translation carries special poignancy: Ó Néill once wrote, 'Because I thought of the day when the door handle would be clean, And the little hand would be gone.' - translated from the Irish poem, Subh Milis (This book has been translated by that 'little hand' – his daughter Eithne – bringing her father's voice to a new generation of English-language readers.)

Séamus Ó Néill (1910-1981) was an Irish language writer and educator born in Clough, Co. Down. He earned an MA in history from Queen's University Belfast and studied under Eoin MacNéill at University College Dublin. Ó Néill was professor of history at Carysfort College, Dublin from 1937 to 1974.

A prolific author, he published short stories, novels, plays, and poetry in Irish. His novel Tonn Tuile (1947), notable for addressing urban middle-class marriage breakdown, was delivered to Sáirséal agus Dill in March of 1946. His anthology Dánta do pháistí (1949) features a striking dust-jacket drawing by Richard Kennedy, Virginia Woolf's former office boy. The final haiku-like poem 'Subh Milis' with its sub-heading 'Ceann do Mhama' is addressed to his wife, echoing his dedication of Tonn Tuile to her: 'Do Chaitlín'.

Ó Néill was also a journalist and editor, contributing to numerous Irish publications and serving as editor of An tUltach. Active in literary circles, he chaired both Cumann na Scríbhneoirí and PEN in Ireland, leaving a significant legacy in 20th-century Irish language literature.

Paris-based Eithne O'Neill is a Dublin-born film critic. She studied in Germany and France before teaching cinema and literature at Paris University 13. On the editorial board of the French monthly Positif for thirty years, she is a member of FIPRESCI (The International Federation of Film Critics) and has served on juries at international film festivals. Her publications include the books Stephen Frears, Le Voyage de Chihiro, Ernst Lubitsch (with Jean-Loup Bourget) and Chemin Faisant, a collection of poems. She has contributed extensively to academic journals on topics ranging from American gangster films to the cinema of Tim Burton and the Quay Brothers.