Flann O'Brien (1911–1966)

Flann O'Brien's The Third Policeman is a novel ahead of its time, more like the novels of the sixties it was posthumously published in than those of the 1930s, the decade it was written in. From its opening confession of murder, causally and casually attributed to the influence of a "lazy and idle-minded" companion, the novel's unnamed protagonist relates his misadventures in a detached, first-person voice which makes him seem more an observer of–rather than a participant in–his own life.

Augmenting the saga of his efforts to avoid being hung for the aforementioned murder with a series of footnotes that would make David Foster Wallace proud, the narrator alternates between intellectual discussions of the obscure philosopher de Selby and the absurd doings of the local police force. The force consists of the pragmatic Sergeant Pluck, whose primary concern is the whereabouts and welfare of local bicycles, the mechanically gifted Policeman MacCruiskeen, whose fantastic inventions are not only beyond human understanding but often intentionally hazardous to their wellbeing, and the elusive Policeman Fox, who spends his nights away from the station invisibly and efficiently solving crimes. While trying to escape his fate at the hands the local constabulary, the protagonist spends time in eternity, is disappointed when the rescue mission of his wooden legged patron saint is thwarted by MacCruiskeen's dementia-inducing pigment, and finds himself inside the walls of his victim's house before finally discovering he has been dead for most of the novel, wandering through hell in punishment of his crime.

The footnotes tell a tale of their own, the strange competition between de Selby's commentators as they argue over the interpretation of his contradictory philosophy, such as his beliefs that night is caused by "accretions of black air" and that man should have no fear of the hallucination of death, since both life and day and night are mere hallucinations themselves.

The Third Policeman is peopled with memorable characters in logically absurd situations that will keep you thoroughly entertained.… (more)

https://fromtheheartofeurope.eu/the-short-fiction-of-flann-obrien/

It’s a short collection of short pieces by the great man. The most interesting stuff is at the beginning, where he pokes fun at Irish language enthusiasts in a couple of pieces originally written in Irish (and heavily footnoted to explain the humour). Most of the middle section is material being tried out for deployment elsewhere (the story about the young man who was born for Ireland gets used twice).

At the end, Jack Fennell presents a story which he is certain is by a 21-year-old Flann O’Brien, and published in 1932 in, of all places, Hugo Gernsback’s Amazing Stories – “Naval Control”, as by “John Shamus O’Donnell”. He has argued the case further in a recent Journey Planet, and I for one am convinced. How glorious, that Gernsback may have published the future author of The Third Policeman!

To be honest, I think this is really a book for Flann O’Brien completists, but there are a lot of us about, and it comes with a good foreword and scholarly apparatus.… (more)