Bye Bye Braverman called him "The Joyce of Brighton Beach," suggesting by analogy a comparison between Markfield and this quintessentially Jewish neighborhood and the essential literary synergy between James Joyce and his native Dublin, but also suggesting other connections. The structure of Markfield's "To an Early Grave", and therefore of the movie based upon it, is to some extent a comic parallel of Joyce's novel "Ulysses", specifically "Episode 6" (which is commonly known as the "Hades" chapter) where protagonist Leopold Bloom and three friends travel in a carriage to attend the funeral of Patrick "Paddy" Dignam who has died in a drunken stupor.
The High Road (novel) Chicago Tribune reviewer Maura Boland thought the novel failed at developing plot and character, writing " lyrical prose and striking metaphors are not enough. The book sags under the weight of literary and religious allusions, and its episodic structure at times almost obscures the narrative." The High Road (novel) The High Road is a 1988 novel by Irish novelist Edna O'Brien. The novel follows an unnamed Irish protagonist as she recovers on a Mediterranean island. It was O'Brien's tenth novel, published 11 years after "Johnny I Hardly Knew You." "Kirkus Reviews" was mildly critical of the novel's style, concluding that