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(Mary Morrissy, Novelist and former associate director of the writing programme, University College Cork)

Politic Words reflects five decades of writing about and discussing Irish literature, both inside the university classroom and in various literary and academic forums. Part one concentrates upon Irish women writers, their influence and example including Edna Longley, Eavan Boland and Eilean Ni Chuilleanain alongside the achievements of younger contemporaries such as Lucy Caldwell and Leontia Flynn. Part two develops some of the historical settings and themes of part one while exploring the social and political legacies of traumatic Irish historical events such as the Great Famine, and its representation in the fiction of William Carleton and reimagined by later interpreters including Benedict Kiely. The collection concludes with a series of readings of Irish culture and politics in terms of the legacy of the Troubles, the impact on Ireland of Brexit and renewed calls for Irish reunification. Politic Words is the final part of a trilogy of studies by Gerald Dawe published by Peter Lang in their Reimagining Ireland series.