The Oxford Companion to Irish Literature
Editor | Robert Welch |
---|---|
Language | English |
Subject | Irish literature |
Publisher | Oxford University Press |
Publication date | 1996 |
Media type | Print (hardcover) |
Pages | 648 |
ISBN | 978-0198661580 |
The Oxford Companion to Irish Literature is a 1996 book edited by Robert Welch.
In over 2,000 entries, the Companion to Irish Literature surveys the Irish literary landscape across sixteen centuries, describing its features and landmarks.[citation needed] Entries range from ogham writing, developed in the 4th century, to the fiction, poetry, and drama of the 1990s.[citation needed] There are accounts of authors as early as Adomnán, 7th-century Abbot of Iona, up to contemporary writers such as Roddy Doyle, Brian Friel, Seamus Heaney, and Edna O'Brien.[1] Individual entries are provided for all major works, from Táin Bó Cuailnge - the Ulster saga reflecting the Celtic Iron Age - to Swift's Gulliver's Travels, Edgeworth's Castle Rackrent, Ó Cadhain's Cré na Cille, and Banville's The Book of Evidence.[citation needed]
The book also presents the historical contexts of these writers, and the events which directly inspired them, such as the Irish Famine of 1845-8, which provided a theme for novelists, poets, and memoirists from William Carleton to Patrick Kavanagh and Peadar Ó Laoghaire; the founding of the Abbey Theatre and its impact on playwrights such as J. M. Synge and Padraic Colum; the Easter Rising which inspired Yeats to write 'Easter 1916'.[citation needed]
It offers information on general topics, ranging from the stage Irishman to Catholicism, Protestantism, the Irish language, and university education in Ireland; and on genres such as annals, bardic poetry, and folksong.[1]
References
- ^ a b Welch 2000, p. [page needed].
Sources
- Welch, Robert (2000). The Concise Oxford Companion to Irish Literature. doi:10.1093/acref/9780192800800.001.0001. ISBN 978-0-19-280080-0.