WHEN IRISH EYES ARE READING

By Michael Shay

My non-Irish friends sometimes ask me: "Hey Mike, what books will help me understand those crazy Irish?" Crazy? I'll show you who's crazy....

Anyway, instead of punching them out (like John Wayne in "The Quiet Man"), I usually buy them drinks and bore them silly with tales of my Irish heritage. My grandfather came to the U.S. from County Roscommon. All my other relatives are Irish, coming to this country following various plagues, famines, wars, and purges. I have yet to visit Ireland, which is rare amongst Irish-Americans, who dream of meeting those relatives who didn't have the sense to leave when the potato crop failed. They also have visions of rambling literary discussions at the village pub.

Ireland is a literary treasure trove and a haven for born storytellers. I know a lot about being an Irish-American but very little about being Irish. Still, in the interest of celebrating St. Patrick's Day 2001 with a reading list instead of a deluge of green beer, here's my list, in no particular order:

Anything by Flann O'Brien, especially the hilarious "The Poor Mouth: A Bad Story About the Hard Life" (get the Dalkey Archives trade paperback edition with illustrations by Ralph Steadman).

Roddy Doyle's "A Star Called Henry" may be one of the best books written about the events surrounded The Easter Rising and the Irish Civil War. His Barrytown trilogy "The Van," "The Snapper," and "The Commitments" were made into three tremendous films. (Warning: If you think Eminem cusses too much, wait until you hear the members of The Commitments.)

Mary Gordon writes great books and stories about the quandary of being an Irish-American.

Any poem by Seamus Heaney.

Thomas Cahill points out the obvious (without the blarney) in "How the Irish Saved Civilization." And it has nothing to do with green beer and three-hour parades.

W.B. Yeats, of course. But, if you want to read the poems Yeats should have written, see Woody Allen's satiric take on "Sailing to Byzantium" in his humor collection "Getting Even."

J.P. Donleavy, especially "The Ginger Man." Donleavy left NYC for Ireland decades ago.

T. C. Boyle: His short stories are a wonder to read. While his stories have been collected in a massive anthology, I still prefer the collection "If This River Was Whiskey." The stories are barbed and funny (you'll never eat sushi again after reading "Sorry Fugu). But it wraps up with a surprisingly sad coming-of-age story about a very Irish subject: alcoholism.

P.J. O'Rourke (what's with Irish-American writers and initials?): Yes, Virginia, there are funny Republicans (and I'm not just referring to Barbara Cubin). O'Rourke used to call himself the Republican Party Reptile. He skewers left and right with equal glee. He has a finely-tuned sense of the outrageous, maybe because he got his start with National Lampoon and then joined Rolling Stone magazine. He still occasionally appears on its pages of RS, witness his recent tale of the 2000 presidential election. My favorite book of his is "Holidays in Hell." It features tales of vacationing in war-torn countries during the 1980s, including Lebanon (it's tough to get a drink on a Friday night in Beirut, especially when mortar rounds are flying everywhere), Nicaragua during the contra wars, and other assorted garden spots.

Now, for those books and writers I should read: 25 years after beginning "Ulysses," I am still at it. I think James Joyce would understand. I should read Frank McCourt's "Angela's Ashes," but was severely depressed after reading an excerpt in The New Yorker. Thomas Keneally of "Shindler's List" fame is Australian-American and a great writer. I aim to read Keneally's "The Great Shame" about the Potato Famine because it will be compelling and well-researched. And the Gaelic poetry by Nuala ní Dhomhnaill and novels by Edna O'Brien.