Ebook A Land of Heroes

These translations or compositions, however, are, besides being lengthy, suited rather for mature minds; the present telling of the Tales is intended to reach the level of children, in the hope that a more lively interest may be taken by these readers in the historic events and places of Ireland. With this view the Tales, drawn from different sources, have been placed in something of chronological order, and an English dress has been given to the Irish names. The deterrent effect of the appearance of Irish words on purely English readers is well known, even without the strangeness of the Celtic element, which is referred to by Dr. Douglas Hyde in his Sketch of Early Gaelic Literature, where he says: The moment the English reader embarks on the sea of native Irish literature he finds himself in absolutely unknown waters. Its allusions are to things and times and events and cycles and dynas ties, strange and unknown to him, and he thus finds himself suddenly launched into a new world, whose existence was by him perfectly unsuspected. And.