The Conference Table (II)

For the first time ever the thriving Society for the Study of Nineteenth-century Ireland will hold a conference outside Ireland, to be hosted Bathspa University College over 9th-11th April, 1999, under the title of "Ireland and the Union: Questions of Identity". Mervyn Busteed, Mike Cronin, Graham Davis, Jacqueline Hill, Patrick Maume, Roger Swift, and others will take the 'long nineteenth century' (i.e., c.1798-c.1922) as their remit. Matters on the agenda include churches, empire, federalism, Catholic unionism and Protestant nationalism, Anglo-Irish identity, the Irish in the British forces, and 'Irishness' in 19th-century literature and historiography. Contact Brian Griffin, Irish Studies Centre, Faculty of Humanities, Bath Spa University College, Newton Park campus, Newton St Loe, Bath BA2 9BN Fax 01225-875503 e-mail b.griffin@bathspa.ac.uk or isc@bathspa.ac.uk. The Paper Call is at http://www.bathspa.ac.uk/hum1.html - where Maclise's "Marriage of Aoife and Strongbow" from the National Gallery of Ireland is handsomely displayed [admittedly ante-dating the Act of Union by some six hundred and twenty-nine years. - Ed.]

On 10th-12th September 1999 year an interdisciplinary conference of the British Association for Irish Studies, also at Bath Spa University, will address the topic "Margins, Mainstreams and Moving Frontiers". Wide-ranging panels will include some of the following matters: the Irish in Britain; the 'Celtic Tiger' phenomenon; emigration; women; the churches; dissident sexualities; queer theory; travellers; writers; the peace process; emergency legislation; abortion; literature; cinema; theoretical perspectives; post-colonialism and the Irish; post-modernism; empiricism; quantitative/qualitative analysis. 15-minute presentations are the rule in order to allow time for questions and discussion, thus reflecting the increasingly dynamic format of Irish studies conferences. A selection of the papers given will be considered for publication in the Irish Studies Centre series. Proposals were invited form 11 January, 1999, to be sent to Neil Sammells, tel. (0)1225-875662 email <n.sammells @bathspa.ac.uk> or Margaret Ward, tel. (0)1225-875592, email <m.ward @bathspa. ac.uk>, both at Faculty of Humanities, Bath Spa University College, Newton Park campus, Newton St Loe, Bath BA2 9BN. [See also the announcement of BAIS £1,000 bursaries on our Bulletin Board.]

Who better the commemorate "The Year of the French" than that French? On 4th-5th June, 1998, the Centre de Recherche Bretonne et Celtique of the Université de Bretagne Occidentale held a conference entitled "Les années des Français en Irlande, 1796-1798" in Brest. French scholars present including Anne-Catherine Lobo (Caen), Alan Boulaire (Kérichen), Jean Guiffan (Nantes), and Pierre Joannon (Irish Consul/Nice) were joined by Daire Keogh (Drumcondra), David Dickson (TCD), and Kevin Whelan (Notre Dame) to discuss the Irish reception of French revolutionary ideas, the logistics of the unsuccessful invasion, and its after-image. Brest was the point of embarkation for the French forces which failed to reach land at Bantry Bay. [Keeping a Brest of the times, eh? - Ed.]

The activities of La Societé Française des Études Irlandaises continue this season with a conference entitled "Réinventer l'Irlande", scheduled for Bordeaux University, 2nd-3rd April 1999, and including as a cultural treat a French version of The Steward of Christendom, translated as Le Régisseur de la chrétienité and directed by Stuart Seide. EFACIS, the newly-fledged and highly promising European Federation of Associations and Centres of Irish Studies) held its Inaugural Conference at Lille during 11th-12th December, and there addressed the topic "Aspects of Ireland: Yesterday and Today". Conference organisation was managed by Eamon O'Kane (EFACIS Research Directory Editor), Politics Division, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Wolverhampton, Dudley Campus, Dudley, DY1 3HR (UK); email <ex1317@wlv. ac.uk>. EFACIS has a web page at http://www.heanet.ie/EFACIS/index.html. Links between IASIL and these organisations-marked by many cross-over memberships-have not yet been diplomatically formalised.

Paul Brennan, President of SOFEIR, was recently acclaimed in the 'Irishman's Diary' column of The Irish Times for his contribution to the standing of Irish writers in France down the years. The occasion for that piece was the grim news that the Cultural Relations Committee of the Irish Foreign Affairs Department is no longer willing to contribute to the production cost of SOFEIR's Irish-studies organ Études Irelandaises - a crucial venue for Irish literary scholarship over nearly three decades. It is worth citing Brennan's presidential mot on the implied estimate of the cultural ambassadorship long sustained by his organisation and its members on behalf of Irish studies since the days of Patrick Rafroidi - himself a grandson of Alfred O'Rahilly, polymath, statesman, and founder of Cork University Press - and latterly sustained by Pierre Joannon by way of intellectual example and material support: 'Nous ne pouvons que [...] constater que l'aide, parfois généreuse, accordée aux études irlandaises en Grande Bretagne et aux Etats Unis soit plus chichement comptée pour ce qui est de la France, qui est, doit-on le rappeler, le premier des pays non-anglophones en ce domaine'. However American and UK members might react to this, IASIL has found itself pleasantly indebted to the CRC in recent times - notably for the funding that Michael Kenneally secured from that source to pay for our revamped brochure. Yet this is no argument for deference and here is surely a matter on which we might consider making recommendations to the CRC. SOFEIR's Web Pages are at http://www.uhb.fr/Langues/ Cei/sof98.htm, where they are hosted by the Centre d'Études Irlandaises at Rennes 2. Good photos of Seamus Heaney in full flight during his striking lecture "Windows of Opportunity: What a Poem Can Do", given at the SOFEIR conference in Nice last March, are published by Richard Deutsch (who took 'em) on a linked page.

In 1896 The Catholic University of America was the first campus to appoint a chair in Irish in the USA and in 1904 it hosted W. B. Yeats on a fund-raising tour for the Irish National Theatre. Its highly-active Center for Irish Studies guest-speaker programme for this year has included lectures by Michael Moloney and Adrian O'Neill - both of the Irish Embassy - on "Ireland at the End of the Milennium" (24th Sept.), Gary Richardson on Eugene O'Neill (5th Nov.), Terry Golway on his forthcoming study of John Devoy (15th Nov.), Lucy McDiarmid on Lady Gregory and the 'Art of Controversy' (25th Jan.), William H. A. Williams on Irish-American music (10th March), Brian Dooley, on US Civil Rights and Northern Ireland (24th March), and Philip O'Leary (Boston College) on "Gaelic Prose in the Irish Free State". In February Nuala Ní Dhomnaill and Paul Muldoon both visited the campus, the former to give a reading there and at the Project Children Gala at the Kennedy Center while Muldoon directed a Poetry Workshop for Irish Studies graduate students. It is currently directed by Timothy Meagher, and may be reached at Marist Hall, 5 Mullen Library, The Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C., USA 20064; tel. 202-319-5065; fax 202-319-6554; email <meagher@cua.edu>.

The jewel in the Center's crown this season is Associate Director Christina Hunt Mahony's survey-study of Contemporary Irish Literature (1998), aptly subtitled "Transforming Tradition", which appeared in December from St. Martin's Press, NY [ISBN 0-312-15871-8 hbk; 0-312-15871-2190-6 pbk.] Everything in this punctilious work is judicious and succinct, making it indispensable for students and scholars. Sebastian Barry has subscribed a cover-note commenting the surefootedness with which Mahony traverses the crowded landscape of modern Irish writing, 'creating stations out of thin air' along the way - an encomium in the imaginative style that makes his rare exercises in criticism delightful. Equally true is his remark that her book exhibits 'quiet brilliance and commanding clarity', which may be compared with Fintan O'Toole's coincidental observations on her 'clarity of vision' - a trait that IASIL members will recall from numerous Conference presentations. A special virtue of the work is that she never pauses to disparage but concentrates instead on finding out the nature of the given piece and estimating its worth (just what James Joyce said literary criticism ought to do).

During the fourth week in March, Millikin University (Decatur, Illinois, USA), is hosting a series of Irish events including readings James Liddy and Eamonn Wall as well as a lecture by Andrew Wilson - all as part of the warm-up to their Irish Theatre Festival featuring works by the Samuel Beckett and some other recent Irish one-act plays. Contact David Gardiner at English Dept., Millikin University, Decatur, IL, 62522; tel. 217-420-6654; website: http://www.millikin.edu/ innews/irishfest. html.

A Conference of the British Society for Population Studies is taking place at UCD from 6th-8th September 1999 this year. Migration and - fully up to speed - the question of Ireland as a site of immigration are on the agenda. Proposals by 31st March to Caitriona Ní Laoire, Centre for Studies in the Social Sciences, Edge Hill College of HE, Ormskirk, Lancs L39 4QP; email <Nilaoirc@staff.ehche.ac.uk>.

A Book-history conference entitled "Overlapping Boundaries" is to be held at the Centre for Irish Literature and Bibliography (UU/Coleraine) on 29th August 1999 as part of a joint-project in Irish Book History with the Institute of Irish Studies of Queen's University Belfast under the direction of Professors Robert Welch and Brian Walker respectively, with substantial funding from the British Academy (UK). Leading scholars involved in the official projects of Britain, Scotland, and Wales will be exchange ideas relating to matters of concern to the SHARP membership and more particularly to book-history editors engaged in national projects. A registration fee of £180 (£95 to student researchers) includes 2 nights of meals with a banquet and tour of Bushmills Distillery and the Giant's Causeway on Monday morning. Make these visits in the right order. - Ed.] Contact Wendy Taulbutt at the Centre, University of Ulster, Coleraine, (UK) BT52 1SA; tel. 01265 324187; fax 01265 324253; email <W.Taulbutt@ulst.ac.uk>.

Professor Welch - whose novel Groundwork (1997) has recently been selected by the Editors' Circle in America - has also mounted a season of events at the Coleraine Centre including talks by Catherine Pratt (Australian Military Academy/UCD) on Australian Literary History (10th March), John Pitcher (St. John's College, Oxford) on Shakespeare and the Book (16th March), and Joanna Kazik (University of Lodz) on the BMV in Early English Plays (5th May), as well as poetry readings by Liam Ó Murtaille with Mary O'Malley (18th April) and Ciaran Carson with Medbh McGuckian (28th April). All welcome-admission free. There is a web site at http://www.ulst.ac.uk/cilb/index.html, revealing past past attainments and future plans at the Centre.

The University of Ulster offers a taught course leading to the Postgraduate Diploma in Anglo-Irish Literature, with four modules in "18th-Century Anglo-Irish Literature and Literary Unionism", "Romantic Nationalism and its Critics", "Discontinuities and Inheritances: Early 20th Century Writing", and "Contemporary Writing". Candidates proceeding to an MA will undertake a dissertation of 20,000 words under individual supervision on completion of the Diploma programme. Tutors on the course include Professors Robert Welch and Joseph McMinn, as well as Elmer Kennedy-Andrews, Ann McCartney, Jan Jerdzejewski, Bruce Stewart, and others. For information, contact Elmer Kennedy-Andrews, Dept. of Languages & Literature, University of Ulster, Cromore Rd., Coleraine, Co. Derry, Northern Ireland, BT52 1SA; <email E.Andrews@ulst. ac.uk>. There is a website at http://www.ulst.ac.uk/cilb/MA.

This Fall at Glucksman Ireland House (NYU) readings were given by Sebastian Barry, Paul Muldoon, and Emma Donoghue, with lectures by Mary Hickman, Sandra Siegel, and others. The Spring programme includes readings from Patrick McCabe (26th January), Emer Martin (17th February), and Joseph O'Connor (1st March), as well as Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill (8th April), Eamon Grennan and Billy Collins (22nd April) Professor J. J. Lee will lecture on the move from "Celtic Twilight to Celtic Tiger" (10th February) and Nicholas Robinson on Edmund Burke (24th February). On the arts side, Frances Quinn offers a one-woman representation of "The Cuchulain Saga" (4th March) while NYU Theatre students together with musicians from the New York Irish community, will present the Glucksman Fleath - an inter-media performance to raise funding for student scholarships to the NYU summer in Dublin (10th March). The address is One Washington Mews, New York, NY 10003, tel 212-998-3950; fax 212-995-4373; email <ireland.house @nyu.edu>. Robert Scally (NYU) is the Programme Director.

On October 4th 1998, a one-day symposium on Irish Gothic Fiction at Glucksman-Ireland House opened with a lecture by W. J. McCormack (Goldsmith, London) on "The Wrong Grave: Locating the Irish Gothic" - as befits the virtual owner of the subject-area. Gothic is widely held to encode political and cultural anxieties; recent criticism at Irish-studies venues suggests that the Irish tradition represented by C. R. Maturin, J. S. Le Fanu, Bram Stoker and others more specifically embodies Irish insecurities about politics, class, religion, property, gender, ethnicity and identity [and the price of cabbage? - Ed.]. Eileen Reilly, Sandra Siegel, Richard Haslam and Patricia Coughlan joined McCormack to give papers aimed at 'situating Irish Gothic'. The contact address was Cheryl Calhoun, Administer; tel. 212-998-3955; email <cac5105@is6.nyu.edu>

Also at One Washington Mews, a two-day conference entitled "We Irish? Formations, Forms and Transformation in Irish Identities" took place on 6th-7th March 1999, aiming to take the discourse on Irishness 'beyond the idea that there is an origin, whether physical, political, social, or textual, from which Irish identities emanate' and hence to arrive at an idea of 'how different practices are organised into diverse identities.' Papers were invited on subjects such as migration, sexual identities, religious identities, translation, the gaeltacht, travellers, the EU, autobiography and biography, colonial formations, Ireland and Britain, and 'whiteness in Ireland'. Sandra Seigel (Cornell) gave the keynote on "Language, Blood and Laughter in Swift and Sheridan". The remaining four-paper sessions showcased work by younger American scholars from Connecticut, Notre Dame, Fordham, Rutgers and NYU, as well as Mary Caffrey (NUI/Galway), Tim Bridgman (TCD) and Derval Tubridy (Goldsmith, London) travelling from afar. The organiser was Oona Frawley, 40 Waterside Plaza, New York, NY 10010, email <hibernet@ lists.nyu.edu>, with a web site at http://www.nyu.edu/pages/irelandhouse/.

The W. B. Yeats Society of New York's 1999 programme includes a lecture by Helen Vendler on "The Wild Swans at Coole" (25th Feb.), when she will also be presented with the Society's M. L. Rosenthal Award. A day-long Yeats Summer School Reunion (17th April) includes talks by Nathan Rose, Deborah Fleming, Gary Richardson, and a good luncheon. On May 18th, James Pethica lectures on "Yeats, Lady Gregory, and 'Easter 1916'", while Yeats's birthday is celebrated at Barnes & Noble on June 13th - before stepping out at the Guinness Fleadh. The Society further plans to commemorate Yeats's death under the banner "Poet, Pass By!", with poetry and music from distinguished guests. The address is W. B. Yeats Society of NY, c/o National Arts Club, 15 Grammercy Park South, New York, NY 10003. 212-780-0605); email Will Linden at <wlinden@panix.com>; website at http://www.panix.com/~wlinden/.

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