Literature in English, 1550–1690: from the Elizabethan settlement to the Battle of the Boyne

There has been much critical work on the symbolic centrality of Ireland to English Renaissance literature and drama. To focus on the latter, Shakespeare's histories have been read topically in terms of the contemporaneous Irish wars and also more historically, in terms of English colonialism in Ireland. Topical readings have been followed by allegorical approaches with, for instance, attention to Othello's "ghostly Irish subtext" (Hadfield, 1997) or Troilus and Cressida's memories of Elizabethan conflict in Ireland (Parker, 1996). Such interpretations suggest scholarly imaginativeness, the discovery of surprising meaning about a text we thought we knew, albeit within a Shakespeare-centric frame. They further suggest the capacity of Ireland to enter a play's imaginary-as problem, as image, as other world. At stake here, then, are interrelated questions about what Ireland is doing in English Renaissance drama, where and when we expect to find it, and how we read it. This essay re-examines the question of why and how Ireland features in plays by Shakespeare and other early modern dramatists. This deceptively simple question is intended to revisit some assumptions that underpin current critical understandings. Why Ireland features in plays has been largely understood as a function of historical contexts and processes: critics and scholars have turned to these as an important site of explanation, with the early modern colonialist discourse on Ireland given special prominence as a determinant of meaning. However, this focus has sidelined other considerations. This article argues for a broadening of context, beyond a focus on topical resonance, to allow for a consideration of dramatic genre and /journal/lic3 1 of 15form, the imitative nature of dramatic writing, and the theatre companies themselves, as important factors that shaped how a text and context like Ireland and the Irish found its way into a play. This approach treats representations as a series of reciprocal markings, intertextual echoes, and foregrounds the capacity of a play to make meaning within its own frame. The objective here is less about discounting the political and ideological work of Renaissance plays than about exploring their possibilities to (re)imagine the early modern "land of ire."

Section: Markingsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Echoesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Beyond Shakespeare's land of ire: Revisiting Ireland in English Renaissance drama

O’Neill

2018

“…For critics attending to its marginalised voices, as much as for those working on writers like Spenser, the fraught social and political circumstances in which these texts were produced cannot be denied. For example, Deana Rankin's pioneering work addresses how writers in seventeenth‐century Ireland articulated the transition from soldier to settler across a century of war and political turmoil (Rankin, ); and Anne Fogarty's magisterial overview of literature in English in sixteenth‐ and seventeenth‐century Ireland stresses the ways in which war and conflict animate the writings of the period (Fogarty, ). Ireland's experiences of conquest and colonialism, of subjugation and oppression, of violence and conflict remain a crucial theme in the scholarship (Covington, ; Dillane, McAreavey, & Pine, ; Edwards, Lenihan, & Tait, ; Palmer, ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Introduction: The literatures of early modern Ireland

Connolly

McAreavey

2018

This is an introduction to recent scholarship on the literatures of early modern Ireland, focusing mainly on literatures written in the English language. It outlines the key developments in the field over the past twenty years. It summarises the findings of the eleven papers published in the special double issue and it outlines the new approaches and methodologies that those papers propose for early modern Irish literary studies.

“…Over the last 25 years, there has been a significant re‐evaluation of several aspects of the literary culture of 17th‐century Ireland (Fogarty, ; Gillespie & Hadfield, ; Kerrigan, ; Rankin, , ) . As historians of the period have become less concerned with high politics in London and Dublin and more with the lives of those who lived through the turmoil of the age, attention has turned to the informal writing of early modern Ireland.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Verse in English from Spenser to Swift

Carpenter

2018

Ireland was in turmoil for much of the 17th century as, slowly and painfully, English language and culture gained supremacy over the language and culture of the native Irish.The verse and poetry we have in English from this period was the work of planters, administrators and the Old English, and, on occasions, of Irish speakers seeking to influence the rulers of the country. During recent years, much exciting new work has been undertaken on the verse of the period as research on manuscripts and early printed books has led to a substantial increase in the canon. We now know of over 100 poets active in Ireland between the time of Edmund Spenser and that of Jonathan Swift.In addition, scholars have begun exploring the links between the culture of 17th-century Ireland and that of Scotland, Wales, and England. This article surveys the work that has been accomplished on the verse and poetry of the period and indicates several areas where further research is needed.Over the last 25 years, there has been a significant re-evaluation of several aspects of the literary culture of 17thcentury Ireland (Fogarty, 2006;Gillespie & Hadfield, 2006;Kerrigan, 2008;Rankin, 2005Rankin, , 2007. 1 As historians of the period have become less concerned with high politics in London and Dublin and more with the lives of those who lived through the turmoil of the age, attention has turned to the informal writing of early modern Ireland. The publication of the 1641 depositions in 2010 (http://www.tcd.ie/history/1641) and the editing of letters and memoirs from the period over the last generation (Analecta Hibernica numbers 43, 45, 46, 48) have enabled us to balance our study more appropriately. There is a wealth of work being undertaken, and there are currently over 100 historians and literary scholars affiliated to the Irish Renaissance Seminar which meets regularly in different parts of Ireland; most of the work being undertaken is on English-language material since, though English was only spoken by a This article surveys the critical and editorial work undertaken, in the past few years, on the verse and poetry written in Ireland in English in the 17th century-that is, between the time of Edmund Spenser and that of Jonathan Swift. It suggests several areas in which more research is needed.