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Anglo-Irish : the literary imagination in a hyphenated culture / Julian Moynahan.

By: Material type: TextTextPublication details: Princeton, N.J. ; Chichester : Princeton University Press, c1995.ISBN:
  • 0691037574
Subject(s): LOC classification:
  • PR8752
Contents:
I. Prologue: "Irish Enough" -- II. Maria Edgeworth (1768-1849): Origination and a Checklist -- III. William Carleton (1794-1869): The Native Informer -- IV. Declensions of Anglo-Irish History: The Act of Union to the Encumbered Estates Acts of 1848-49 ... With a Glance at a Singular Heroine -- V. Charles Lever (1806-72): The Anglo-Irish Writer as Diplomatic Absentee. With a Glance at John Banim -- VI. The Politics of Anglo-Irish Gothic: Charles Robert Maturin, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, and the Return of the Repressed -- VII. History Again: The Era of Parnell - Myths and Realities -- VIII. Spinsters Ball: George Moore and the Land Agitation -- IX. "The Strain of the Double Loyalty": Edith Somerville and Martin Ross -- X. W. B. Yeats and the End of Anglo-Irish Literature -- XI. After the End: The Anglo-Irish Postmortem.
Summary: In their day, the Anglo-Irish were the ascendant minority - Protestant, loyalist, privileged landholders in a recumbent, rural, and Catholic land. Their world is vanished, but shades of the Anglo-Irish linger in the big-house estates of Ireland and in the imaginative writings of this realm. In this first comprehensive study of their literature, Julian Moynahan rediscovers the unity of their greatest writings, from Maria Edgeworth's Castle Rackrent through Yeats's poetry to Bowen's The Last September and Samuel Beckett's Watt. Throughout he challenges postcolonial assumptions, arguing that the Anglo-Irish since 1800 were indelibly Irish, not mere colonial servants of Imperial Britain. Moynahan begins in 1800 with the Act of Union and the dissolution of the Dublin Parliament, at which point the Anglo-Irish become Irish. Just as the fortunes of this community begin to wane, its literary power unfolds. The Anglo-Irish produce a haunting, memorable body of writings that explore a unique yet always Irish identity and destiny. Moynahan's exploration of the literature reveals women writers - Maria Edgeworth, Edith Somerville, Martin Ross, and Elizabeth Bowen - as a generative and major force in the development of this literary imagination. Along the way, he attends closely to the Gothic and to the mystery writing of C. R. Maturin and J. S. Le Fanu, and provides in-depth revaluations of William Carleton and Charles Lever.
Holdings
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Two Week Loan Two Week Loan de Havilland Learning Resources Centre Main Shelves 841.3 MOY (Browse shelf(Opens below)) Available 4404416985
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Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

I. Prologue: "Irish Enough" -- II. Maria Edgeworth (1768-1849): Origination and a Checklist -- III. William Carleton (1794-1869): The Native Informer -- IV. Declensions of Anglo-Irish History: The Act of Union to the Encumbered Estates Acts of 1848-49 ... With a Glance at a Singular Heroine -- V. Charles Lever (1806-72): The Anglo-Irish Writer as Diplomatic Absentee. With a Glance at John Banim -- VI. The Politics of Anglo-Irish Gothic: Charles Robert Maturin, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, and the Return of the Repressed -- VII. History Again: The Era of Parnell - Myths and Realities -- VIII. Spinsters Ball: George Moore and the Land Agitation -- IX. "The Strain of the Double Loyalty": Edith Somerville and Martin Ross -- X. W. B. Yeats and the End of Anglo-Irish Literature -- XI. After the End: The Anglo-Irish Postmortem.

In their day, the Anglo-Irish were the ascendant minority - Protestant, loyalist, privileged landholders in a recumbent, rural, and Catholic land. Their world is vanished, but shades of the Anglo-Irish linger in the big-house estates of Ireland and in the imaginative writings of this realm. In this first comprehensive study of their literature, Julian Moynahan rediscovers the unity of their greatest writings, from Maria Edgeworth's Castle Rackrent through Yeats's poetry to Bowen's The Last September and Samuel Beckett's Watt. Throughout he challenges postcolonial assumptions, arguing that the Anglo-Irish since 1800 were indelibly Irish, not mere colonial servants of Imperial Britain. Moynahan begins in 1800 with the Act of Union and the dissolution of the Dublin Parliament, at which point the Anglo-Irish become Irish. Just as the fortunes of this community begin to wane, its literary power unfolds. The Anglo-Irish produce a haunting, memorable body of writings that explore a unique yet always Irish identity and destiny. Moynahan's exploration of the literature reveals women writers - Maria Edgeworth, Edith Somerville, Martin Ross, and Elizabeth Bowen - as a generative and major force in the development of this literary imagination. Along the way, he attends closely to the Gothic and to the mystery writing of C. R. Maturin and J. S. Le Fanu, and provides in-depth revaluations of William Carleton and Charles Lever.