The William Trevor Reader: “Events at Drimaghleen”

This might actually win the award for the bleakest story in the —a sentence I suspect I’ve written at least three times now. ’s standard mode is bleak, as over and over he describes the inability for people to alter or often even admit the straitened terms of their existence, so it takes a real doozy to stand out as bleak in comparison to the average. But such is the case with “Events at Drimaghleen,” which might make an even further case as one of the darkest stories ever written, rivaling classics like‘s “Noon Wine” and ‘s “American Express.”