Barney McKenna – “Banjo Barney from Donnycarney” – was one of the founder-members of the Dubliners, the world-famous Irish folk musicians and singers who in 2002 celebrated forty years on the road as a band. For Dubliners fans, Barney’s name immediately conjures up the image of the burly, bearded banjo genius who

dazzled the audience with his virtuosity while charming them with his folksy, no-nonsense personality. However, Barney was also well known for another reason: he was capable of bringing any conversation to a sudden stop by uttering something so completely unexpected, and at the same time so incomprehensible, as to reduce

everyone present to a bemused silence. These surreal verbal gems, collected in this book, have become known simply as “Barneyisms”.