The Barracks. London: Faber, 1963. First Edition. Red cloth boards with gilt title to spine, in publisher’s first issue dust jacket. Jacked lightly frayed along top edge, otherwise a fine bright copy.

First published in 1963 – and banned from McGahern’s local library – The Barracks won the AE Memorial Award and is a remarkably confident first novel by a man who went on to become a giant of modern Irish literature.