This course will focus on Irish literature of the last two centuries as a case study in the way history, culture and politics interact in the formation of a distinctive literary tradition. We will begin with a overview of the literature of the Gaelic and early colonial periods, and briefly consider texts from the Irish "Revival" of 1800-1830, during which the problems of Irish cultural, literary and political self-definition in a colonial context-the effort to construct or assert "Irishness" as an identity distinct from Englishness-became sharply outlined. Our principal focus will be on the "Irish Renaissance" of c. 1890-1925, during which Irish writing in the English language became firmly identified as a canon distinct from the English tradition, and writers such as Yeats and Joyce achieved international status. 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 Sean O'Casey. We will foreground key fault-lines of the period: competing visions of Irish identity and of the role of literature in promoting cultural and/or political change; debate over the propriety of writing in English, drawing on English literary traditions, or seeking an English audience; the work of "self-exiles" like Shaw and Joyce, versus that of writers who stayed in Ireland; and the long-entrenched ideological and political tensions between Catholics and Protestants, and landowners and tenants, in Ireland. The course will conclude with consideration of post-independence literature, and of the extraordinary current vitality of Irish literary culture, with reading of works by Brendan Behan, Seamus Heaney, Martin McDonagh, and discussion of 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 by the effort to reconceive both Ireland's literary past and its present in terms of post-colonial theory. Format: discussion/seminar. 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. Preference given to first-year students, sophomores, and English Majors who have yet to take a Gateway. (1700-1900)