A fictional imagining of the gentle but troubled zealot William Cowper--best known as a precursor to Romantics such as Wordsworth and Burns--Brian Lynchs The Winner of Sorrow brings to life the mind and times of an eighteenth-century poet. Intense and exhilarating, this is literary fiction at its finest--the reader will be hard-pressed not to rush ahead to see what happens next. Yet youll want to savor every word as Lynch traces Cowpers tragic descent into madness, which is presented matter-of-factly so that the novel is not sentimental but austere, not precious but serious, and yet, remarkably, lively, sensuous, and blackly comic."A wonderful book." -The Sunday Tribune"At once moving, instructive and slyly funny, that rare thing, a recuperation of a poet by a poet." -John Banville"A brilliant re-imagining of the troubled life of William Cowper." -Dermot Bloger"An exceptional Irish writer." -Thomas Kilroy, Irish Independent"If you want the low-down and high-down on the delicate, brutal reality of a poets life, you must read The Winner of Sorrow." -Paul Durcan"Beautifully written, poignant, witty and profound." -Clare Boylav