CLASP, 144 pp, €19.00, Hardback, 25 cm, ISBN: 1 900545 8
Price: €19.00
Paperback, ISBN: 1 900545 16 0, Price: €12.00

“Nowt so queer”, Tony Canavan

If folk studies can be regarded as a branch of serious academic endeavour today, it was not always so. Westropp was something of a pioneer in the field and among the first to take a scientific, or at least a systematic, approach to the study of folklore. This nineteenth-century book probably fulfils most people’s notion of folklore, being a collection of legends, lore, ghost stories, superstitions, etc. It may have been superseded by modern approaches and methodology, but it has never been discredited.

We should be grateful that CLASP, a local history project, has brought out this modern reprint of Westropp’s original. Whatever its shortcomings for the modern academic, it is still a treasure of Clare folklore and a hugely enjoyable read.

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