So Late in the Day: Stories of Women and Men

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of gender discrimination. 

Claire Keegan is an Irish author. She is best known for her short stories and novellas. She was born in County Wicklow, Ireland, in 1968. At the age of 17, she relocated to New Orleans, Louisiana to study English and political science at Loyola University. In 1992, she moved to Cardiff, Wales, where she received a degree in creative writing at the University of Wales. She also taught writing at this same university. Thereafter, Keegan went on to earn a degree from Trinity College Dublin.

Keegan published her first short story collection Antarctica in 1999. The collection includes the short stories “Antarctica,” “Love in the Tall Grass,” “Men and Women,” “The Ginger Rogers Sermon,” and “Sisters.” Antarctica was awarded both the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature and the William Trevor Prize. It explores themes including sexual violence, misogyny, and domesticity—themes that recur in Keegan’s subsequent publications. In 2007, Keegan published her second short story collection, Walk the Blue Fields. The collection includes “Walk the Blue Fields,” “Night of the Quicken Trees,” and “The Forrester’s Daughter.”

In 2009, Keegan published “Foster” in long, short-story form. The original piece was awarded the 2009 Davy Byrnes Short Story Award, appeared in a February 2010 issue of The New Yorker, and was later included in the 2011 Best American Short Stories.