Crosson, Seán; Huber, Werner (eds.)

Towards 2016: 1916 in Irish Literature, Culture & Society is cognisant of the multiple perspectives and events that are associated with 1916 in Ireland and their continuing relevance to Irish literature, culture and society. The collection considers a broad range of cultural forms and societal issues, including politics, theatre, traditional music, poetry, James Joyce, greyhound sports, graphic novels, contemporary fiction, documentary, language, political representation, and the Irish economy with contributions from both emerging academics and established scholars. Also featured is an interview with acclaimed film director and novelist Neil Jordan (conducted by novelist Patrick McCabe) on his life and work, including his biopic Michael Collins (1996), a work which includes one of the most memorable renderings of the Rising and its aftermath. Among the questions considered in the collection are: What were the formative influences on one of leaders of the Rising, James Connolly? What effect had the Rising on Ireland’s fledgling labour movement? What impact did the Rising have on the Abbey and Irish theatre? What connects 1916, James Joyce, and the Cuban Revolution? What is the relevance of 1916 to Irish traditional music? What place has 1916 in contemporary Irish fiction and poetry? What are the relations between the Rising, sequential art, popular culture, and memory? A century after the 1916 Proclamation spoke of equality between women and men, could Ireland be finally about to realise equal gender distribution in politics? Does ‘Irish sovereignty’, a central concern of the Rising leaders, have any relevance for Ireland in the contemporary globalised and European Union context?