Darby O’Gill and the Good People

Herminie Templeton Kavanagh gathered these comic Irish folk tales in 1903, introducing Darby O’Gill, a quick-tongued farmer who keeps stumbling into the company of the fairies, or as the country people call them, the Good People. Across a handful of linked stories Darby outwits Brian Connors, the King of the Fairies, bargains his way out of an underground fairy fort, and trades wits with a leprechaun and a wailing banshee. Kavanagh writes in a warm Hiberno-English brogue, mixing superstition, sly humor, and real affection for rural Ireland. The tales later gave Walt Disney the basis for his 1959 film. Readers can download the complete collection as a free PDF and EPUB edition.