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1977 · 85163 — Dublin Ireland: Dolmen Press 1977. Limited Edition 1/650 copies. Limited edition 1/650 copies. Quarto. Black cloth over boards 10 5/8 in. x 7 1/4 in. with striking painting by Louis le Brocquy of a rook in flight to front board. White lettering to spine. Housed in Black and Red on White dustjacket. 78 pp with red and black lettering to dustjacket spine. <br /> <br /> It is interesting to note that while creating the images for this book the artist le Brocquy was healing from an injury which encased his primary drawing/painting hand in plaster. He writes: "In my present task I have not had the use of my right hand which is immobilised in plaster. With my available left hand I cannot write nor do any precise operation at all. It is encouraging therefore to note that this clumsy left hand produces illustrations as well as paintings which are not less articulate than those formerly made with my right. It would seem to show that no predictable skill whatever is involved and that images emerge not by imnposition on my part but as it were automatically -- jerked into coherence by a series of vaguely directed accidents discovered rather than executed. In illlustrating THE GODODDIN I discovered nothing but rooks. This would be less disconcerting were I preoccupied with Ted Hughes's CROW. As it is I have had to accept their persistent presence in THE GODODDIN as a kind of counterpoint to its own repetitive and compassionate insistence and in renewed irony as a recurrent image of the unscathed victor" "Aneirin the sixth-century Welsh poet is reputed to have been one of a handful of survivors from the battle of Catraeth which inspired his epic poem THE GODODDIN.Desmond O'Grady's belief is that what Aneirin wrote of his war is true of all wars and informs the purpose of his version which is to give a 'reading' of the poem as one way in which it might have been written today."<br /> <br /> Louis le Brocquy executed magnificent brush drawings for Thomas Kinsella's version of the Irish epic THE TAIN.has provided a series of ink paintings to accompany Desmond O'Grady's text. Dolmen Press unknown