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‘Destined to be a classic’ Sunday Independent
‘Gabriel Byrne tells his story brilliantly’ – Edna O’Brien
‘Dazzles with unflinching honesty’ Washington Post
‘An absolutely marvellous book’ – Colm T�ib�n
Born to working-class parents and the eldest of six children, Gabriel Byrne harboured a childhood desire to become a priest. Four years later, Byrne had been expelled from an English seminary and he quickly returned to his native Dublin. There he took odd jobs as a messenger boy and a factory labourer to get by. In his spare time he visited the cinema, where he could be alone and yet part of a crowd. It was here that he could begin to imagine a life beyond the grey world of ’60s Ireland.
It was a friend who suggested Byrne join an amateur drama group, a decision that would change his life forever and launch him on an extraordinary forty-year career in film and theatre. Moving between sensual recollection of childhood in a now almost vanished Ireland and reflections on stardom in Hollywood and on Broadway, often through the lens of addiction. Hilarious and heartbreaking Walking With Ghosts is a lyrical homage to the people and landscapes that ultimately shape our destinies.
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The wonder of this memoir is its unembellished truth. It is written by a man whose amazing story is the stuff of literature
Edna O’Brien
So beautiful, it seems extraordinary that [Byrne] has kept this light under a bushel all this time . . . Gorgeous
Graham Norton, BBC Radio 2
An absolutely marvellous book . . . beautifully written, poetic . . . it’s a really riveting read
Colm T�ib�n
Gabriel Byrne has written the most beautiful memoir. This is haunting prose and wondrous, sad, uplifting, my book of the year
Claire Keegan
Walking With Ghosts is lavish with lyricism, but presents a pretty unvarnished version of its author . . . The book is also a conscious departure: stylistically ambitious, purposefully (and successfully) so
The Guardian
Thoughtful, moving and without a trace of self-indulgence, this honest and beautifully-written book reads more like a novel than a memoir, drawing the reader into a narrative that is full of courage, humour and above all, humanity. I really loved Walking with Ghosts and can't recommend it highly enough
Christine Dwyer Hickey
Imagine S�amus Heaney's eye falling on Hollywood's glare . . . it really did remind me of S�amus Heaney, it seemed to have that very sharp focus and also that wonderfully lyrical way of expressing it
Richard Coles, BBC Radio 4
Make no mistake about it: this is a masterpiece. A book that will wring out our tired hearts. It is by turns poetic, moving and very funny. You will find it on the shelf alongside other great Irish memoirs including those by Frank McCourt, Nuala O'Faolain and Edna O’Brien
Colum McCann, author of Let the Great World Spin
The allure of Gabriel Byrne's memoir is that it persuasively humanizes what it is to be a big deal movie star. Byrne is wonderfully without cant or bluster or phony humility. Instead he leads with felicity, candor, humor and empathy. In the end, he seems to be somebody you'd be glad to know
Richard Ford
Byrne arrives at a truth greater than an honest and sensitive memoir; he verges on a profoundly touching articulation of our short time on earth, time that will make of each of us nothing more or less than a ghost
Irish Independent – Mia Colleran
A wry and warm, swirling poetic reverie of a memoir
Colin Barrett
A joy of a book – full of heart and humour, beautifully told
Sin�ad Gleeson
Destined to be a classic . . . What makes Gabriel Byrne a great writer is that he knows that whether we are wicked or good, few of us get what we deserve
Sunday Independent
Reading the book was a beautiful experience; it’s superb. It really is a very special book so if you love someone buy it for them for Christmas
Eamon Dunphy
Structured around an imaginary, haunted visit to the Dublin of his youth, the book does offer sketches from the movie wonderland – John Boorman being bossy on Excalibur, testy encounters with Laurence Olivier in the 1980s – but it is more to do with conjuring up a now-vanished Ireland. The smell of the Guinness brewery. Early acting experiences in a nativity play. The church, everywhere the church
Irish Times
The writing is so vivid it’s as if we are by Gabriel Byrne’s shoulder through the sorrowful times and the joyous moments. He weaves an intimate and absorbing tapestry of the poignant and the funny
Kirsty Wark
A working-class family memoir as well as a meditation on fame and its discontents
Observer – Sena O’Hagan
Walking with Ghosts is exquisite. This book feels like the culmination of a long literary career and not the debut of a famous actor. Byrne makes himself fully vulnerable while in total command of language and form. There is great truth and great beauty in this close examination of a life and the passage of time. I’ve never read a memoir so raw and honest and literary and absolutely, staggeringly brilliant
Lily King
| Weight | 0.154 kg |
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| Dimensions | 196 × 130 × 14 cm |
