This course will focus on Irish literature and literary criticism of the last two centuries as a case study in the way history, culture and politics interact in the construction of a distinctive literary tradition. We will begin with a brief survey of representative writings from the Irish Revival of 1800-1830, in which the problems of cultural and national self-definition in a colonial context-the effort to construct or assert "Irishness" as an identity distinct from Englishness-first became sharply outlined. Readings from this period will include Lady Morgan's influential novel The Wild Irish Girl and the poetry and illustrations to Thomas Moore's popular Irish Melodies. Our principle focus will be on the Irish Renaissance of c.1890-1930, during which Irish writing in the English language became firmly identified as a canon distinct from the English tradition. Readings will include drama, poetry, fiction, and non-fiction prose by Yeats, Synge, Somerville and Ross, Joyce, George Moore, George Bernard Shaw, Lady Gregory and O'Casey. We will foreground key fault-lines of the period: competing constructions of Irishness and visions of Irish Nationalism; conflict over the role of literature in promoting a separatist cultural politics; debate over the propriety of writing in English, or for an English audience; the writing of "self-exiles" like Shaw and Joyce, versus the work of writers who stayed in Ireland; the legitimacy of drawing on English literary traditions; and the inevitable ideological and political tensions between the concerns of Irish Catholics and Protestants, landowners and tenants. The course will conclude with consideration of post-independence literature, and of the extraordinary literary Revival currently under way in Ireland, with reading of works by Brendan Behan, Frank McGuinness, Seamus Heaney, and Neil Jordan's film "The Crying Game." Key considerations here will be the ways traditional Nationalist concerns have recently been reinflected by contemporary sexual politics, and the effort to reconceive both Ireland's literary past and its present in terms of post-colonial theory. Requirements: four papers (3-4 pages for the first, rising to 6-8 pages for the last), several short journal-style writing assignments, and active participation in discussion. Prerequisites: a 100-level English course, except 150. Enrollment limited to 19. (1800-1900/1700-1900)