Emerald Green: An ecocritical study of Irish literature

This study of Irish literature examines, in chronological order, Irish writers whose subject matter is Ireland's natural world, and the dissertation imparts the value of nature to Irish culture and society. Using ecocritical sources from outside traditional scholarship on Irish literature, the dissertation examines current concerns of a changing Ireland, where nature is under threat.; Chapter 1 begins with Ireland's forests and examines early Irish hermit poetry, followed by the poetry early Christian hermits. This section also examines Seamus Heaney's translation of Buile Shuibhne, and several versions of the myth are examined in the dissertation, including poems by Yeats in Chapter 3 and Sean Lysaght in Chapter 6.; Chapter 2 of the dissertation examines the change in literature and landscape after the forests, focusing on the Irish dependency on farming, the plight of the Famine, and the ruined landscape, where nature becomes enemy. Writers such as Maria Edgeworth, William Carleton, Anthony Trollope, and Emily Lawless are examined with their settings in an unfamiliar landscape.; Chapter 3 explores the revival of the Irish language and focuses on the Irish Revivalists, including Lady Gregory, Yeats and his early nature poetry, the presence of the pagan forest in George Moore's novel The Lake , and AE's theosophical connection to Ireland's nature in both his memoirs and poetry. The landscape and nature of Ireland's islands are examined in Chapter 4, including Achill Island, the Aran Islands, Skellig Michael, and the Great Blasket.; Poets of Northern Ireland--and their connection to Ireland's wild west coast-- are examined in Chapter 5, including Patrick Kavanagh, Louis MacNeice, Seamus Heaney, and Michael Longley and explores the redemptive sentiment implicit in their nature poetry.; Chapter 6 concludes the dissertation with environmental writers, including personal interviews with Michael Longley, Sean Lysaght, and Michael Viney. This chapter also examines Praeger's The Way That I Went, along with other early naturalists, including Sean Lysaght. The dissertation concludes with an examination by environmentalists on the future of nature in Ireland and an Appendix of Environmental Organizations in Ireland that offer practical ways to help preserve Ireland's natural world.