The Irish Review, No.13 (Winter 1992/93, 179pp. [Cork Univ. Press].

Ed., Kevin Barry, Tom Dunne, Edna Longley, Caoimhin Mac Giolla Leith, Clare O’Halloran and Brian Walker

CONTENTS

[Section:] Autobiography

Patrick O’Sullivan, ‘Courting the Interior: Contemporary Literary Criticism and the Autobiographical Impulse’, pp.1-13. Debates the increasing popularity of the ‘autobiography’ in literary criticism since the 1930’s, where theoretical warfare between two differing models of literature’s relationship with history, one civil, the other, political, is given free reign; inquires into the purpose of the autobiographical medium, what anxieties is it appeasing, what concealed alliances is it establishing in literary circles and why is it coming to the fore now?; refers regularly to Denis Donoghue’s Warrenpoint and briefly to Raymond William’s The Country and the City and Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes.

Mairín Nic Eoin, ‘O An tOileanach go dti Kinderszenen - an taoise dirbheathaisniseach i bprós-scribhneoireacht na Gaeilge’, pp.14-21 [as Gaeilge].

Gerard Barrett, ‘Disrobing the Vestry: Autobiographical Writing in the Thirties’, pp.22-30. Deliberates the thirties writer’s escape into the ‘womb-world’ of autobiographical writing, a refuge from the narration of harsh, historical events; provides examples from the works of Elizabeth Bowen, Christopher Isherwood, Francis Stuart and Henry Green, highlighting their excessive comparisons of their personal experiences with such calamities as the Jewish holocaust, trench warfare and racist inhumanity.

Andrew Gailey, ‘An Irishman’s World’, pp.31-39. Reviews the autobiographical novel, Pleasant Places, written by the Belfast born, comic novelist and priest, Canon J. O’Hannay, during the early twentieth century; briefly outlines the issues treated in his book such as Arthur Griffith, Sinn Fein, the Gaelic League and Douglas Hyde as well as his attitudes towards the church and his personal life, education, politics, family and mysticism, while alluding to his many publications including The Seething Pot, Hyacinth, The Irish Protestant, The Northern Iron and Benedict Kavanagh.

Siobhan Kilfeather, ‘Look Who’s Talking: Scandalous Memoirs and the Performance of Gender’, pp.40-49. Deliberates the type-casting of eighteenth century women in Irish literature and theatre where the simplification of the female identity allowed women very limited role play where as men enjoyed any number of character types; adverts to the careers of George Anne Bellamy and Margaret Leeson while alluding also to the memoirs of Christian Davies, Ann Faucault and Margaret Woffington; cites theories on gender as performance, from Judith Butler’s Gender Trouble.

Joe Broderick, ‘Life as Novel’, pp.50-55. Drafts the basic format of his biographical novels on two priests, the first, Camilo Torres, a Colombian priest turned guerrilla-fighter who died in combat in 1966, set in the context of the political and social history of Colombia; the second more recent publication, Fall From Grace, on the ex-Bishop of Galway, Eamonn Casey, which includes the dramatic personal insight of the events from Annie Murphy while highlighting the self-delusory aspects of the situation.

Frank Lentricchia, ‘Ciotóg’, pp.56-69. Offers a jaunty, anecdotal breakdown of literary Ireland and narrative technique and briefly refers to his experiences of Joyce and Dublin, Yeats and Sligo and the American Monk, Don De Lillo in Galway.

Sean Ryder, ‘Male Autobiography and Irish Cultural Nationalism: John Mitchel and James Clarence Mangan’, pp.70-77. Confronts the limits and contradictions of bourgeois ideology in anti-colonial struggle where nationalistic imaginings are conditional on masculinity and deny female subjectivity; compares Mitchel’s masculine discourse in Jail Journal and The Life and Times of Aodh O’Neill to Mangan’s poetic portrayal of personal childhood incidents and emotions, regarded as a more feminist approach; draws attention to the ‘enabling’ role of women’s domestic labour in the lives of both writers.

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Liz Stanley, ‘An Auto/Biographer Manque: Theorising A Faile Biography of Peter Sutcliffe’, pp.78-86. Theorises on the similarities and differences which can be found in biographical and autobiographical writing, stressing the characteristic features of the forms of documenting a life, the complex nature of reading this form and contesting realist forms; outlines four stages of this form of writing, as the reader/consumer, an analytical focus, a feminist perspective and the autobiographical view; relates his theories to his own attempt to document the life of Peter Sutcliffe, his trial, the media and the legal system.

George O’Brien, ‘The Absurdist’, pp.87-92. Short, amusing anecdote relating the antics of an Irishman, Bill, abroad.

J. H. Andrews, ‘Notes for a Future Edition of Brian Friel’s Translations’, pp.93-106. Includes brief introduction to Friel’s proposed play Translations.

Liam Kennedy, ‘Modern Ireland: Post-Colonial Society or Post-Colonial Pretensions’, pp.107-21. Argues against the interpretation of Ireland as a post colonial society thus making it comparative to Third World societies; undergoes a systematic comparative analysis of Ireland in relation to Third World countries, in terms of pre-independence days, present day and as a neo-colony; concludes that this misconception arises both from yielding to superficial parallels as well as inaccurate interpretations by Irish historians, ultimately making trite the real suffering of the people in the Third Worlds.

Peggy O’Brien, ‘Lough Derg, Europe and Seamus Heaney’, pp.122-30. Debates the contrasting opinions of Irish writers regarding the Lough Derg ‘myth’, transcendental religious experience and European influences in Irish society, depicting Lough Derg as an icon of Irish national culture as well as of European Catholic culture; welcomes Heaney’s Station Island and his open-minded presentation of the mystical tradition both in an Irish and European context; alludes to the writings of William Carleton, Patrick Kavanagh, Denis Devlin as well as Shane Leslie’s compilation of Lough Derg’s literary history.

Michael D. Higgins, ‘The Challenge of Building the Mind of Peace...Asserting the Humanistic Vision’, pp.131-42. Address by Michael D. Higgins on being presented with the Sean MacBride Peace Prize by the International Peace Bureau in Helsinki on Sunday 30th August 1992.

Trevor Joyce, ‘Two Poems’: ‘The Turlough’; ‘Cry Help’ [ded. Brian Coffey], , pp.143-45.

Ciaran Carson, ‘Bagpipe Music’, pp.146-48 [poem].

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Richard English, ‘Counterblasts and Policies’, pp.149-53, review of Conor Foley, Legion of the rearguard: the IRA and the modern Irish state (London: Pluto Press 1992); Michael J. Cunningham, British government policy in Northern Ireland 1969-89: its nature and execution (Manchester: Manchester Univ. Press 1991). Deems Foley’s book ‘anti-revisionist’ as it attempts to account for adversities in Irish history which are inadequately treated by revisionist historians while covering issues of republican politics during the 1920’s and 30’s; Conceives Cunningham as thorough and well organised in providing a comprehensive layout of British government legislation in the last two decades which includes details on constitution, security, economics and social policy.

Clare O’Halloran, ‘The Challenge of the Catholics’, pp.153-58, review of Thomas Bartlett, The Fall and Rise of the Irish Nation: the Catholic Question 1690-1839 (Dublin: Gill and Macmillan 1992); S.J. Connolly, Religion, Law and Power: the Making of Protestant Ireland 1660-1760 (Oxford: Clarendon Press 1992). Notes the central theme to Bartlett’s publication is the condition of the Irish and British governments, as well as opposition groups of any denomination, in relation to the Catholic question; Remarks on Connolly’s contention to study the mentality of the Protestant elite by means of focusing on their social structures, politics, legal system and religion, concerning himself predominantly with re-valuating the accepted stereotype of them as rude, immoral and intimidated by the Catholic majority.

Norman Vance, ‘Convert Syndromes’, pp.159-62, review of Louis McRedmond, Thrown Among Strangers: John Henry Newman in Ireland (Dublin: Veritas Publications 1990); Jerusha Hull McCormack, John Gray, Poet, Dandy and Priest (Hanover, NH: Brandeis Univ. Press; London: Univ. Press of England 1991); Norman White, Hopkins. A Literary Biography. (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press 1992). Criticises McRedmond’s warm hearted complacency in his treatment of Cardinal Cullen, Archbishop Daniel Murray of Dublin and Peel’s proposed secular university, believing these areas to require a more critical and challenging analysis; Commends McCormack’s chronicling of the life, works and personality of John Gray, remarking, however, on the absence of discussion on sexuality and Catholicism in the 1890’s; Finds White’s review of Hopkin’s poetry, set in social, cultural, personal and intellectual contexts, stimulating and competent.

Allison Rolls, ‘Uncritical Heritage Industry’, pp.162-65, review of Jacqueline Genet (ed.), The Big House in Ireland: Reality and Representation (Dingle: Brandon 1991); Otto Rauchbauer (ed.), Ancestral Voices: The Big House in Anglo-Irish Literature (Dublin: Lilliput Press 1992). Castigates Genet’s unfounded assumptions regarding the ‘English invaders’, the absence of reference material and the shallow treatment of the Big House theme; Praises Rauchbauer’s edition for the challenging theories on this genre, especially W.J. McCormack’s essay on Maria Edgeworth and Christopher Morash on Charles Lever.

Tom Dunne, ‘Unchained Melody’, pp.165-69, review of Conor Cruise O’Brien, The Great Melody: A Thematic Biography and Commented Anthology of Edmond Burke (London: Sinclair-Stevenson 1992). Annotates O’Brien’s scholarship, evident in this recent offering as intellectually, sympathetic and engaging, highlighting the similarities between O’Brien and Burke as well as O’Brien’s use of Vico’s ‘fantasia’ in his representation of Burke.

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Andrew Hadfield, ‘Coloniser and Proselytiser’, pp.169-72, review of Sir William Herbert, Croftus Sive De Hibernia Liber. (ed. with trans.) Arthur Keaveney and John A. Madden (Dublin: Irish Manuscripts Commission 1992). Perceives a random focus in Croftus, drifting from historical, geographical, religious and philosophical perspectives, although the evident knowledge of the classics and European politics is commended.

David Stevens, ‘Shattered Churches?’, pp.172-77, review of Duncan Morrow, The Churches and Inter-Community Relations (Univ. of Ulster: Centre for the Study of Conflict 1991); P. Roche and B. Barton (eds.), The Northern Ireland Question: Myth and Reality (Avebury: Aldershot 1991); John M. Barkley, Blackmouth and Dissenter (Dundonald: The White Row Press 1991); Cahal B. Daly, The Price of Peace (Dundonald: Blackstaff Press 1991); Robin Eames, Chains To Be Broken (London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson 1992); Michael Casey, What Are We At?: Ministry and Priesthood for the Third Millennium (Dublin: Columba Press 1992); David Rice, Shattered Vows: Exodus from the Priesthood (Dundonald: Blackstaff Press 1991); Dermot Lane (ed.), Peter Connolly - No Bland Facility: Selected Writings on Literature, Religion and Censorship (Gerards Cross: Colin Smythe 1991); Patrick Hannon, Church, State, Morality and Law (Dublin: Gill and Macmillan 1992). Marks Morrow’s book as an illuminating resource on the role of Churches in Northern Ireland society; Roche and Barton offer an insight to the diversity within the Ulster Protestant community; Finds Barkley defensive of the Presbyterian tradition, taking a rather romantic view; Appreciates Daly’s ongoing work against violence and his understanding and awareness of the necessity to accept to identities in Northern Ireland; Remarks on the significance of Eames in the Protestant church which enables him to portray, vividly, the insecurity and fears of the Protestant community; Notes Casey’s treatment of the issue of celibacy in the priesthood; Finds Rice’s interpretations of the crisis in the Catholic church refreshingly direct and well documented; Welcomes Lane’s collection of essays which reflect on the evolution of Irish society; Applauds Hannon’s intelligent presentation of the controversiality of the morality and law within the Catholic tradition.

Michael Allen, ‘Intertextual Phenomenon’, pp.177-79, review of Neil Corcoran. ed., The Chosen Ground: Essays on the Contemporary Poetry of Northern Ireland (Bridgend, Mid Glamorgan: Seren Books 1992). Congratulates Corcoran on his superb illustration of the intertextual marvels of Northern Ireland’s poetic contributions, paying particular attention to the works of Seamus Heaney, Michael Longley, Paul Muldoon, Medbh McGuckian and Tom Paulin, to name but a few.

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