Term 1

Week 1    Introduction

The Big House Novel

Week 2   Beginnings: Maria Edgeworth, Castle Rackrent (1800) [OUP]

Week 3   Ancestral Houses: Somerville and Ross, The Big House of Inver (1925) (Rowman and Littlefield)

Week 4   Coming of Age: Elizabeth Bowen, The Last September (1929) [+ film screening] (Vintage)

Week 5   The Troubles: J. G. Farrell, Troubles (1970) [Phoenix]

 

Romance, Rebellion and Writing

Week 7   Celtic Revival and Nationalist Politics: Yeats, The Rose (1893), The Wind among the Reeds (1899); Yeats and Lady Gregory, Cathleen ni Houlihan (1899); Lady  

                      Gregory,  The Rising of the Moon (1907) [The poetry: Yeats, Collected Poems, Picador; the plays: Modern Irish Drama, ed. John Harrington]

Week 8   The Easter Rising: Yeats, 'Easter 1916', 'Politics' (and other poems); Patrick Pearse, poetry [Yeats poetry: as above; Pearse poetry - to be distributed]

Week 9   The Easter Rising II: James Stephens, The Insurrection in Dublin (1916) [Colin Smythe]

Week 10  The Plough and the Stars: The Abbey and Hollywood: Sean O'Casey, The Plough and the Stars (1926) [in Three Dublin Plays (Faber)]; John Ford, The Plough and the Stars (film) [+ screening]

 

 

Term 2

 

'Authentic Ireland': The Birth of the Irish National Theatre

Week 1    Irish Melodrama: Dion Boucicault, The Colleen Bawn (1864); The Shaughraun (1876) [in Selected Plays, ed. Andrew Parkin (Colin Smythe, 2006); The Shaughraun (Kessinger 2007)]

Week 2   The Irishman Abroad: George Bernard Shaw, John Bull's Other Island (1904) [in Modern Irish Drama, ed. John Harrington, or by Standard Publications, 2008]

Week 3   The Abbey Theatre: J. M. Synge, The Playboy of the Western World (1907) [in Modern Irish Drama, ed. John Harrington, or by Dover or Penguin]

Week 4    The Abbey Theatre II: Sean O'Casey, Juno and the Paycock (1924) [in Modern Irish Drama, ed. John Harrington, or Three Dublin Plays by Faber]

 

Irish Gothic

Week 5  The Double and Ireland: Sheridan Le Fanu, ghost stories (1872) [in Madam Crowl's Ghost [Wordsworth Classics]; Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891) [OUP or Penguin]; Elizabeth Bowen, ghost stories (1930-50) [in Collected Stories, Vintage]

Week 7   There Will Be Blood: Bram Stoker, Dracula (1897) [ed. Hindle, Penguin Classics]

Week 8    Haunted Theatre: Yeats, Purgatory (1939) [in Modern Irish Drama, ed. John Harrington]; Samuel Beckett, All that Fall (1956); Footfalls (1981) [+ film screening] [in Complete Dramatic Works (Faber)]; Marina Carr, By the Bog of Cats (1988) [Faber]

Week 9  Postmodern Gothic: John Banville, Birchwood (1973) [Picador]

Week 10  Bog Gothic: Patrick McCabe, The Dead School (1995) [Picador]

  

Assessment

 The course is asssessed either by 2 x 5000 word essays (100%) or by 1 x 5000-word essay (50%) and 1 x 2-hour exam (50%).

 

Teaching

10-11.30 on Wednesdays, room H543 (Humanities)