The Third Policeman is Flann O'Brien's second novel, written in 1939 and 1940 but not published until 1967, after the author's death. Flann OBrien Flann OBrien was the best known pseudonym of the man who was born Brian Ó Nuallain (in English Brian ONolan) (born in Strabane, County Tyrone in Ireland on October 5, 1911) and who also published under the name Myles na gCopaleen. ... // Events January-March January 2 - End of term for Frank Finley Merriam, 28th Governor of California. ... 1940 (MCMXL) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will take you to calendar). ... 1967 (MCMLXVII) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

The unnamed narrator of The Third Policeman is a student of a scientist/philosopher named de Selby, and, as is revealed in the opening paragraph of the novel, has committed a robbery and a violent murder. The narrator seeks a black box belonging to his victim, believing it to contain money which he will use to finance the writing and publication of the definitive critical work on de Selby. The ostensible setting is an Irish country parish, the features of which become increasingly unfamiliar and out of proportion through the course of the novel. The narrator finds a police barracks, hoping to enlist the policemen into locating the black box for him. There he meets two of the three policemen, who speak in a curious mélange of spoonerisms, solecisms, and malapropisms; and there he is introduced to various peculiar or irrational concepts, artifacts, and locations, including a contraption that collects sound and converts it to light, a vast underground chamber called 'Eternity,' an intricate carved chest containing an infinite series of identical but smaller chests, and a theory of the transfer of atoms between a man and his bicycle: De Selby is the name of a fictitious Irish philosopher and scientist, originally invented by Flann OBrien, for his novel The Third Policeman. ... A Spoonerism is a play on words in which corresponding consonants or vowels are switched (see metathesis), named after the Reverend William Archibald Spooner (1844–1930), Warden of New College, Oxford, who was notoriously prone to this tendency. ... In linguistic prescriptivism, a solecism is a grammatical or other mistake or absurdity. ... Look up Malapropism in Wiktionary, the free dictionary A malapropism (from French mal à propos, ill to purpose) is an incorrect usage of a word by substituting a similar-sounding word with different meaning, usually with comic effect. ...

The gross and net result of it is that people who spend most of their natural lives riding iron bicycles over the rocky roadsteads of this parish get their personalities mixed up with the personalities of their bicycle as a result of the interchanging of the atoms of each of them and you would be surprised at the number of people in these parts who nearly are half people and half bicycles.

Other odd characters found in the novel include the narrator's soul, named Joe, and Martin Finnucane, a one-legged bandit. Contributing to the atmosphere of illogic is a series of digressions and footnotes by the narrator on the subject of de Selby and his highly unorthodox theories (he believes the phenomenon of nighttime to be explainable as an accretion of 'black air'), as well as extended discussions of de Selby's various critics. At times these footnotes disruptively span several pages and threaten to overtake the novel's primary storyline while at the same time seeming to influence the setting and action of the novel, giving credence to critical claims that the novel can be regarded as a work of metafiction that prefigures later trends in postmodern fiction, or at the least a satirical and parodical take on rationalism and academic language. The self-referential nature of the book is evident from the ending; the storyline gradually brings us to the point where the book starts, and the last few paragraphs are the same as the opening... Metafiction is a kind of fiction which self-consciously addresses the devices of fiction. ... Postmodernity (also called post-modernity or the postmodern condition) is a term used by philosophers, social scientists, art critics and social critics to refer to aspects of contemporary art, culture, economics and social conditions that are the result of the unique features of late 20th century and early 21st century...

The book's influences (or targets of satire) are thought to include such diverse subjects as Einstein's theory of relativity, the mystic-scientific works of J.W. Dunne, the theology of Thomas Aquinas, Cartesian dualism, J.K. Huysmans's decadent novel À Rebours, and John Synge's play The Playboy of the Western World. Satire is a literary technique of writing or art which exposes the follies of its subject (for example, individuals, organizations, or states) to ridicule, often as an intended means of provoking or preventing change. ... Albert Einstein photographed by Oren J. Turner in 1947. ... Wikisource has original text related to this article: Relativity: The Special and General Theory Albert Einsteins theory of relativity is a set of two scientific theories in physics: special relativity and general relativity. ... John William Dunne (1866 - 1949) established his career as an aeronautical engineer working on many early military aircraft. ... Wikisource has original works written by or about: Thomas Aquinas Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Thomas Aquinas By Aquinas Summa contra Gentiles Summa Theologiae The Principles of Nature On Being and Essence (De Ente et Essentia) Catena Aurea (partial) Corpus Thomisticum - the works of St. ... Cartesian dualism was Descartess principle of the separation of mind and matter and mind and body. ... Joris-Karl Huysmans (born Charles-Marie-Georges Huysmans, February 5, 1848 – May 12, 1907) was a French novelist. ... Decadence was the name given, first by hostile critics, and then triumphantly adopted by some writers themselves, to a number of late nineteenth century fin de siècle writers associated with Symbolism or the Aesthetic movement. ... John Millington Synge John Millington Synge (April 16, 1871 - March 24, 1909) was an Irish dramatist, poet, prose writer, and collector of folklore. ... The Playboy of the Western World is a play written by J. M. Synge and first performed in January 1907. ...

Publication history

In 1940, O'Brien submitted the manuscript for The Third Policeman to Longman's, the English publisher of his first novel, At Swim-Two-Birds, but they declined to publish: "We realize," read the rejection notice, "the author's ability but think that he should become less fantastic and in this new novel he is more so." The American author William Saroyan, who had become acquainted with O'Brien during a brief stay in Dublin, offered the use of his literary agent in finding an American publisher, but this too was an unsuccessful effort. Deeply discouraged, O'Brien made no further attempts at publication, and shelved the manuscript, claiming that it had been lost. He would later cannibalize elements of The Third Policeman for use in The Dalkey Archive, published in 1964 and generally agreed to be an inferior work. A year after O'Brien's death, though, his wife produced the manuscript, and it was finally published. The work is now regarded by commentators as a masterpiece; its posthumous publication, tragic. 1940 (MCMXL) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will take you to calendar). ... Longman is a firm of English publishers. ... At Swim-Two-Birds is a novel by Irish novelist Flann OBrien (one pen-name of Brian ONolan) published in 1939. ... William Saroyan (August 31, 1908 - May 18, 1981) was an Armenian-American author who wrote many plays and short stories about growing up impoverished as the son of Armenian immigrants. ... Dublin (Irish: Baile Átha Cliath), is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Ireland, located near the midpoint of Irelands east coast, at the mouth of the River Liffey and at the centre of the Dublin Region. ... The Dalkey Archive is a novel by the Irish writer Flann OBrien. ... For the Nintendo 64 emulator, see 1964 (Emulator). ...

References in popular culture

The novel was prominently featured in the October 5, 2005 episode of the hit television series Lost. At one point during the episode (entitled 'Orientation'), a copy of the book can be seen. The episode concerns the main characters' discovery of a mechanism which they are told must be reset at every 108 minutes by entering the numbers (4 8 15 16 23 42), or else "the world will be destroyed". Lost is an American drama/adventure television series surrounding the survivors of a plane crash on a mysterious tropical island in the South Pacific. ... This article contains episode summaries for the second season of the American drama/adventure television series Lost ; the new episodes began airing September 21, 2005. ...

Further reading

• Cronin, Anthony. No Laughing Matter: The Life and Times of Flann O'Brien. Grafton Books (1989).
• Hopper, Keith. Flann O'Brien: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Post-Modernist. Cork University Press (1995).
• Kenner, Hugh. A Colder Eye: The Modern Irish Writers. Alfred A. Knopf (1983).

Hugh Kenner (January 7, 1923 – November 24, 2003), Canadian literary scholar, critic, & professor. ...

External links

• An excerpt from The Third Policeman, chapter 4
• Literary Encyclopedia: The Third Policeman