LIT 4184 Fall 2020 Stilling

This course will examine issues in Modern Irish Literature with special attention given to contemporary Irish poetry, puncuated with selected works of fiction, drama, and film. 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 literature 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. The poets studied will include W.B. Yeats, Louis MacNeice, Seamus Heaney, Paul Muldoon, Eavan Boland, Medbh McGuckian, and Derek Mahon, among others, as well as drama and fiction by Brian Friel, James Joyce, Elizabeth Bowen, and Donal Ryan.