Modern Irish prose writing can be productively understood as a network of constantly developing and interconnecting styles and genres. There is the naturalist strand, beginning with the novels of George Moore but more often associated with Joyce’s Dubliners, which critics track through the mid-century short story writers (Frank O’Connor, Seán O’Faoláin, Mary Lavin) and the post-war realists (Edna O’Brien, John McGahern) to contemporary novelists such as Colm Tóibín and Anne Enright.