Author: Declan Kiberd<br />File Type: pdf<br />Ireland is suffering from a crisis of authority. Catholic Church scandals, political corruption, and economic collapse have shaken the Irish peoples faith in their institutions and thrown the nations struggle for independence into question. While Declan Kiberd explores how political failures and economic globalization have eroded Irish sovereignty, he also sees a way out of this crisis. After Ireland surveys thirty works by modern writers that speak to worrisome trends in Irish life and yet also imagine a renewed, more plural and open nation.After Dublin burned in 1916, Samuel Beckett feared the birth of a nation might also seal its doom. In Waiting for Godot and a range of powerful works by other writers, Kiberd traces the development of an early warning system in Irish literature that portended social, cultural, and political decline. Edna OBrien, Frank OConnor, Seamus Heaney, and Michael Hartnett lamented the loss of the Irish language, Gaelic tradition, and rural life. Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill and Eavan Boland grappled with institutional corruption and the end of traditional Catholicism. These themes, though bleak, led to audacious experimentation, exemplified in the plays of Brian Friel and Tom Murphy and the novels of John Banville. Their achievements embody the defiance and resourcefulness of Irelands founding spiritand a strange kind of hope. After Ireland places these writers and others at the center of Irelands ongoing fight for independence. In their diagnoses of Irelands troubles, Irish artists preserve and extend a humane culture, planting the seeds of a sound moral economy.ReviewOutstandingDeclan Kiberds After Ireland gives a perceptive, capacious account of life and letters since 1945. It looks back with wit and regret from the disappointments of austerity.bbbJohn Kerriganbb, bbTimes Literary SupplementbStimulatingAfter Ireland is the final part of a rough trilogy, following on from the justly acclaimed Inventing Ireland and Irish ClassicsKiberd himself has often been most illuminating on the life in death of the Irish language, and After Ireland is a peculiarly lively postmortem in which, as in Finnegans Wake or Cre na Cille, the corpses refuse to take death lying down and the graveyard is full of incessant chatterIt is wonderfully written, jargon-free, witty and exuberantly engaging. What makes Kiberd a great critic is his disdain for barriersbetween Irish and English, between literary forms, between works and their historical moments. He is as superb on Maire Mhac an tSaoi and Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill as he is on Seamus Heaney and Derek Mahon. His erudition in both languages makes his essay on Michael Hartnett, who moved between them, a beautiful meditation on double-mindedness. His equal ease with drama, fiction and poetry means that he is often brilliant in his exposure of unexpected connections.bbbFintan OToolebb, bbFinancial TimesbDeclan Kiberds After Ireland is an engrossing joy, a book packed with insight.bbbJoseph OConnorbb, bbIrish TimesbAfter Ireland offers a rich and expansive understanding of how, despite its political and cultural travails, such a relatively small island earned such an outsized role in the making of the modern imagination.bbbPeter Quinnbb, bbCommonwealthbEnergetic, imaginativeKiberd [has a] sparkling and probing styleThis taste for heightened drama and inclination toward painting in bold colors and challenging assertions have always made reading Kiberd a pleasure the verve, insight, and imagination of the critical interventions in this book lie at the heart of its appeal.bbbRoy Fosterbb, bbNew York Review of BooksbKiberd is a masterful critic he knows the writing of Ireland from head to toe. Anyone whos interested in Irish literature would benefit from this volume.bbbLucas Spirobb, bbArts FusebKiberd is the only major Irish literary critic who gives serious attention to writing in the Irish language, and this energetically-argued book represents another distinguished contribution to Irish literary criticism and cultural debate. Kiberds range and inclusivity are, as ever, extremely impressive. After Ireland offers fresh and detailed readings of a number of undervalued works, including many by women writers. An indisputably rich and accomplished work.bbbEmer Nolan, Maynooth University, IrelandbBooks like After Ireland dont come around very often, and when they do, theyre such a pleasure, in part, because of the depth of vision, one that can only come from someone like Declan Kiberd who has thought deeply about the subject for a lifetime. Kiberd mixes the old Irish standardsBeckett, Friel, Boland, and Doylewith lesser known examples such as Eilis Ni Dhuibhne, Joseph OConnor, and Claire Keegan in this major achievement of a book.bbbEric Bulson, Claremont Graduate UniversitybA major contribution, indispensable to contemporary Irish writing. Declan Kiberds range and acuity are impressive.bbbMichael D. Higgins, President of IrelandbImpressive in scope and erudition, Kiberds book is required reading for anyone interested in Irish studies, modernism, or post-colonialism.bbbV. A. Murrenusbb, bbChoicebbb About the Author bDeclan Kiberdb is the author of Inventing Ireland, Ulysses and Us and Irish Classics. He has won many literary prizes. He is currently Professor of English at the University of Notre Dame in the USA.