Three important Irish texts use revelations about Irish involvement in the First World War as a lens through which to examine contemporary Ireland: Jennifer Johnston’s novel How Many Miles To Babylon (1974), Frank McGuinness’s play Observe the Sons of Ulster Marching Towards the Somme (1985), and Sebastian Barry’s A Long, Long Way (2005). Because significant critical attention has been paid to the texts of Johnston and McGuinness, and because access to Barry’s archive in the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas further illuminates the process by which Barry represents this crucial moment in Irish history, his novel is the focus of this paper. Unlike Johnston and McGuinness, whose projects use the First World War to interrogate the Ireland in which they are writing and force the reader to grapple with their own historically (or mythically) constructed identities, Barry’s A Long, Long Way denies personal culpability and allows for a view of history in which the individual stands forever as a tragic or pathetic victim. Barry’s novel details the experiences of one Irish soldier, Willie Dunne, on the Western Front and plots his changing attitude towards Irish soldiers’ involvement in the War following the Easter 1916 Rising. Exposed to both nationalist and loyalist perspectives, and to the horrors of war, Willie increasingly develops sympathy with the nationalist position, though he never abandons his principal loyalty to his father. While Willie’s narrative presents a more complicated vision of the Dunne family—Barry’s ancestors who have figured prominently in his oeuvre—it fails to escape the tragic impulse in much of Barry’s fiction, in which history is an immovable and oftentimes malevolent force. Such a vision of history allows individuals like Willie Dunne to disavow responsibility for their personal fate and for their roles within a larger Irish history. / text

What could the early Irish literature of the sixth to twelfth century and the Hebrew Bible of a millennium or more before have in common? Literacy came to Ireland with Christianity, and the Bible had a special relationship to Ireland's considerable corpus of both ecclesiastical and vernacular literature. Exactly how this relationship is manifest is a question that has been at the centre of debate in early Irish studies for fifty years. I have moved away from traditional approaches in an effort to address this question. Early Irish studies has long suggested a dichotomy between classifying early Irish literature as being solely the product of a monastic milieu and its imported literacy, and as a transcription of centuries of preChristian oral narrative (which would have more in common with proto-Indo European culture than early Christian Ireland). The way to address the snags of simplistic comparison is to examine the 'first' text - in this case, the Bible - as scrupulously as the early Irish texts. I have chosen three rather different kinds of protagonist from different sections of the Bible and different parts of early Irish literature. I compare the Book of Jonah with episodes from different Lives of Columba, the Book of Esther with the 'Historical Cycle' tale 'Tochmarc Becfhola', and Samson with Cú Chulainn in three different 'Ulster Cycle' tales. After discussing different patterns and themes within the narrative of each pair, I conclude that each episode includes a character whose weakness is the focus of that episode. I do not propose that this distilled theme of weakness has 'provoked' the creation of the early Irish analogue in the first place, but that in the final analysis, perhaps by different means, this theme emerges. My willingness to work with contemporary critical methods places this work firmly in the 20^th century, while drawing attention to the complexity of thought already manifest in the literature of the 10^th, and before.

Thesis (Ph.D.) in Individualized Ph.D. Program--University of Maine, 2004. / Includes vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 321-329).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Universität Salzburg, 1983. / Bibliography: v.2, p. 626-638.

<p> This thesis utilizes concepts of the ecocritical theory of deep ecology to elucidate non-anthropocentricism and nature&rsquo;s agency as depicted by three apocalyptic eco-narratives written in the long nineteenth century: Mary Shelley&rsquo;s <i>The Last Man</i> (1826), Richard Jefferies&rsquo; <i> After London</i> (1885), and M. P. Shiel&rsquo;s <i>The Purple Cloud </i> (1901). I offer readings of these texts as &ldquo;Anthropocenic&rdquo; science fiction novels, building upon Paul J. Crutzen&rsquo;s work on the Anthropocene, our current geological epoch. Utilizing literary, historic, and scientific rationale, I make an argument for the reframing of literary periods according to geological transformations due to human interaction with the environment and collectively term apocalyptic eco-narratives written at the time of the Industrial Revolution through today as &ldquo;Anthropocenic.&rdquo; In my analysis, I demonstrate how Shelley&rsquo;s, Jefferies&rsquo;, and Shiel&rsquo;s science fiction works exaggerate environmental concerns contemporary to their respective historical moments, and I offer deep ecological interpretations of their perceptions of industrialism and pollution, specifically in and around London. I also expound upon the way in which all three novels depict nature as an active, nonhuman character with agency and intention, either inducing an ecological apocalypse to protect itself or, as in Shiel&rsquo;s novel, to punish humanity for ecological crimes. My &ldquo;deepist&rdquo; approach attempts non-anthropocentricism whenever possible and allows a progressive, nontraditional critique of these texts primarily from nature&rsquo;s perspective&mdash;not humanity&rsquo;s. Particularly, this thesis is interested in how nature retakes and re-greens spaces that are polluted by human activity or abused in the interest of human consumption. Demonstrating the way in which perceptions of nature&rsquo;s agency evolved through the long nineteenth century and providing historical context for Great Britain&rsquo;s ecological condition, I position that these three Anthropocenic texts ultimately blame London&rsquo;s industrialism for ecological devastation in and around the city and conflate natural phenomena, like volcanoes, with industrialist pollution in fictional explorations of nature&rsquo;s agency and potential ability to retaliate against humanity for irresponsible environmental practices. In the last chapter, I analyze the way in which Biblical allusion is used in <i>The Purple Cloud</i> to both sensationalize and rationalize punishment for anthropogenic climate change as an ecological sin according to the Book of Genesis.</p><p>

<p> Alternate Reality Games (ARGs), a genre of transmedia experiences, are a recent phenomenon, with the first recognized ARG being <i>The Beast </i> (2001), a promotion for the film <i>A.I.: Artificial Intelligence </i> (2001). This dissertation seeks to more clearly define and investigate contexts of transmedia narratives and games, specifically ARGs. ARGs differ from more popular and well-known contemporary forms of gaming in several ways, perhaps most importantly by intensive use of multiple media. Whereas a player may experience most or all of a conventional video game through a single medium, participants in ARGs must navigate multiple media and technical platforms&mdash; networks of websites, digital graphics, audio recordings, videos, text and graphics in print, physical objects, etc.&mdash; in order to participate in the experience of the ARG. After establishing a history of ARGs, the author defines both transmedia and ARGs and begins to build typologies to help distinguish individual examples of the genres. Then, after building the above framework for analyzing transmedia and ARGs, the author explores the relevance of the ARG genre within three specific contexts. These contexts serve as tools to excavate potential motivators from creative and participatory standpoints. The author refers to these motivations as three logics of ARGs: industrial, cultural, and educational. The industrial logic examines the advantages of transmedia and ARG production from the entertainment industry standpoint, in terms of an alternative to franchising and as a way to extend intellectual property (IP), as well as offering interactive possibilities to an engaged audience. The cultural logic examines the relationship between the emergence of digital media, transmedia, and ARGs and the aesthetic appeal of the form and genre as paranoia, puzzle-solving, and collective meaning making within a shifting representation of reality through networked embodiment and challenging long-held assumptions of ontological and phenomenological experiences. Finally, the educational logic of ARGs analyzes the potential and use of the genre as an immersive, constructivist learning space that fosters self-motivated individual and collaborative analysis, interpretation, and problem-solving. </p><p>

Eilís Dillon, in her young adult novels, evokes to her readers rich images: wind blowing in off the cold and vast Atlantic Ocean over the rugged landscape of rocks and stone-walls with ancient forts inhabiting the highest points, and thatched roof houses squat and solid against nature. This dissertation will explore the multifaceted position of the fictional child, the reader and adult as they each encounter exhilarating adventure on Dillon's windswept islands. The connection between the fictional child in, and the child reader of, the world of Eilís Dillon's Irish children's novels illustrates the capacity for young adult literature to be an effective means of conveying problematic ideas to a young audience. Eilís Dillon uses the nostalgic realism of her west coast island stories to preserve, while at the same time critique, her native Ireland. This will be analyzed through examination of the interrelationship between the fictional children that provide the narrative voice, the child reader, and the adult author. At the same time this dissertation will discuss Dillon's relationship to her contemporaries and subsequently, her relationship to children's fiction coming out of Ireland. Dillon's nostalgic realism which enhances the image of rural Irish island life is at the heart of what scholars past and present take from Dillon's body of work.

<p> <i>Kingdom in the Sky</i> is a collection of ten stories that expose the impact and residues of the regime of Apartheid in the southern hemisphere of Africa, Lesotho. The stories are threaded together by their narrator&mdash;Qenehelo&mdash;a boy who takes care of his ill parents, and loses them at age twelve. Qenehelo takes an <i>English Dictionary</i> and a <i>National Geographic Magazine</i>, and teaches himself English. Assisted by a good-hearted Peace Corps volunteer, Qenehelo is saved and educated. The stories center around the orphaned narrator&rsquo;s undertakings as he takes on adult responsibilities. This collection reveals the Boers&rsquo; oppression and duplicitous acts in the education systems, producing texts with rhetoric that repudiates native languages, undermines traditional epistemology, and misrepresents the theft of African land. With my stories, I hope to inspire struggling youth around the globe to remain strong and hopeful, and to transform their visions into reality. My intention is to help further the resistance against colonial western influence and all consequent oppression.</p><p>

This study examines the critical prose written by William Butler Yeats in the period 1896-1903, and identifies the evolution within it of a mode of literary history. I concentrate on Ideas of Good and Evil, and on the selected edition Poems of Spenser. The introduction examines notions of golden ages and of original fracture, and the insertion of these tropes into a variety of literary histories. I consider some of the aims and problems of literary history as a genre, and the peculiar solutions offered by Yeats's approaches. I give particular attention to Yeats's alternation between two views of poetry: as evading time, and as forming the significant history of nations. The first chapter examines those essays in Ideas of Good and Evil written earliest. I consider the essays on Blake first, because Blake was the most significant influence on the writing of Yeats's idiosyncratic literary histories. I proceed to the essays on Shelley, on a new age of imaginative community, and on magic. The second chapter demonstrates how Yeats's ideals and ideas became modified in more practical considerations of audience, poetic rhythm and theatrical convention, and I identify the new kinds of literary history in the essays on Morris and Shakespeare, which are concerned with fracture, limitation and the loss of unmediated access to timeless imaginative resources. The third chapter briefly examines Yeats's very early imitations of Edmund Spenser, and then considers the uses of literary history in Yeats's edition of Spenser. The final chapter identifies Yeats's later returns to Spenser, and shows how the earlier modes of literary history governed subsequent adaptations. My conclusion summarises the advantages and limitations of Yeatsian literary history, and place my study into the context of Yeats's whole career, comparing these literary histories with A Vision

<p> This study investigates how key Victorian novelists, such as Anne and Charlotte Bront&euml;, Elizabeth Gaskell, Charles Dickens, Wilkie Collins, Mary Elizabeth Braddon, George Eliot, and Thomas Hardy, emphasize performativity in their critiques of marriage. Given the performative nature of wedding ceremonies, this project focuses on wedding descriptions in select novels by the aforementioned authors. Such a focus highlights an interesting dilemma. Although we often think of Victorian novels as overwhelmingly concerned with marriage, the few wedding descriptions found in Victorian fiction are aborted, unusually short or announced after the fact. Those Victorian novelists who do feature weddings often describe them as grotesquely theatrical to underscore the empty performativity associated with contemporaneous wedding rituals that privilege form over substance, and to stress deception and inauthentic play-acting in marriage. In these ways, the key Victorian novelists draw attention to a gap between the empty formalism of marriage as a legal, religious and social institution, and the reality of many Victorian marriages. </p><p> Nevertheless, many of the same novelists who show their general distaste for the empty performativity of weddings, acknowledge that theatricality itself plays a more complex role in their marriage plots, raising questions about authenticity, fraud and pious deceptions in marriage. For example, Wilkie Collins complicates the argument about theatrical weddings by stressing that quiet weddings, performed without much pomp and ceremony, may also signify deceptive marriages. Moreover, Thomas Hardy emphasizes the value of festive public weddings, which solidify the spouses&rsquo; connection to their community. Additionally, both the realist and sensation novelists discussed here, especially Anne Bront&euml;, Dickens, Braddon, and Collins, condone temporary play-acting and deception, which extend beyond weddings, if such performances allow their characters to circumvent inflexible and unjust marriage laws. </p><p> In sum, this dissertation analyzes how key Victorian novelists redefine courtship and marriage by focusing on the performative aspects of marriage as a legal and social institution. Those redefinitions are, at times, non-linear and contradictory. They also relate to the continual enmeshing of two primary modes of Victorian narrative, realism and sensationalism, which complicates the view of performativity in marriages as either artificial or authentic. </p><p>