Thady Quirk, devoted steward to the decaying estate of the Rackrent family,
narrates a riotous story of four generations of a dying dynasty in Castle
Rackrent (1800). Thady will defend his masters to the end, but eventually
his naivety and blind loyalty cause him to ignore the warning signs as the
family’s excesses lead them to ruin. This volume also includes Ennui, the
entertaining ‘confessions’ of the Earl of Glenthorn, a bored, spoiled
aristocrat. Desperate to be free from ‘the demon of ennui’, Glenthorn’s
quest for happiness takes him through violence and revolution, and leads to
intriguing twists of fate. Both novels offer a darkly comic and satirical
exposé of the Irish class system, and a portrait of a nation in turmoil.