This superb account of life on the Great Blasket Island off the west coast of Kerry, written as the nineteenth century draws to its close and the dawn of a new era trespasses on the lives of its small community, is both a shocking and captivating read.Here is the first complete translation of Toms O'Crohan's autobiography An tOilenach, first published in 1929. This edition is based on Professor Sen Coilein's definitive 2002 Irish-language edition. It contains many passages omitted from the previous English language translation by Robin Flower from the 1930s, some of which were thought too earthy for the times.Toms O'Crohan, a fisherman who, at around the age of forty, has taught himself to read and write in his own native tongue, depicts in unaffected, vivid language a very unforgiving landscape of human experience. The Islander reflects life as it was on the Blaskets - raw, real and extremely challenging.