Funds for Bookworm are provided in part by Lannin Foundation.

You are a human animal.

You are a very special breed.

Or you are the only animal.

Who can think, who can reason, who can read.

From KCRW Santa Monica, I'm Michael Silverblatt, and this is Bookworm. Today, my guest is the

renowned Irish writer, Edna O'Brien. Her most recent novel, published by Houghton Mifflin,

is in the forest. She's recently done a biography of James Joyce in the Viking series of brief biographies

that was made a very deep impression on the literary world.

Her most recent books include House of Splendid Isolation Down by the River Wild December.

Her collected stories are gathered in a fanatic heart.

She's the author, of course, of the famous Country Girls trilogy and many, many other books as well.

Now, in the forest takes a decided turn toward the dark,

and I wanted to ask you what set of circumstances

had allowed you to work on such a dark book?

Well, I could, there are many reasons.

I love, for instance, Greek tragedy.

For story and for tension or dynamic and for profundity,

you cannot surpass Greek tragedy. Greek tragedy is dark. In the forest, as you say, is dark. It is, was instigated, if that's the right verb, by an actual murder that took place in Ireland eight years ago.

And that was a mother, a young child and a priest, all taken to the forest by the mother and child first,

and then six days later, six nights later, the priest, by a young local man who was

deranged and who had come back from prison in jail, from prison in England.

...