Alan Gilsenan is an Irish writer, filmmaker and theatre director. His documentaries, which range from robust investigation to essayistic reverie to sensitive observation, are distinguished by intellectual rigour and creative innovation, allied to a seemingly unquenchable curiosity about history, literature, culture and society – both in Ireland but also in the wider world. His highly eclectic oeuvre of over 40 films for cinema and television also provides an invaluable compendium of reflection on Irish minds and Irish matters over four decades.