The book is a kindly parody of the genre of Gaeltacht autobiographies, such as Tomás Ó Criomhthain's autobiography (The Islandman), or Peig Sayers' autobiography "Peig", which recounts her life, especially the latter half, as a series of misfortunes in which much of her family die by disease, drowning or other mishap. Books of this genre were part of the Irish language syllabus in the Irish school system and so were mandatory reading for generations of children from independence in 1921. O'Nolan was in fact a great admirer of "An t-Oileánach", which is widely regarded as being the greatest work of the genre, but critic Declan Kiberd has noted how O'Nolan's admiration for a writer tended to express itself as parody of the writer's work.