LIT 4184 Spring 2018 Stilling

This course will examine modern and contemporary Irish poetry. While our course begins with W.B. Yeats, we will spend most of our time on later poets, including well known figures such as Louis MacNeice, Seamus Heaney, Paul Muldoon, Eavan Boland, Medbh McGuckian, and Derek Mahon, and younger poets such as Justin Quinn, Conor O'Callaghan, and Colette Bryce. We will discuss emerging trends in Irish poetry, the legacies of modernism and colonialism, the history of emigration and sectarian conflict ("the Troubles"), the relation between poetry in Irish (Gaelic) and poetry in English, the institutionalization of Irish poetry in the American academy, and varying conceptions of Irish poetry as postcolonial, transnational, and world literature. In doing so we will explore how Ireland's complex and troubled history has given shape to a rich and complex literature.

This course satisfies the requirement for coursework in the following Areas of Concentration: Post-1900 Literature and Culture; Colonial, Postcolonial, and Transnational Literary Studies.