Modernity, politics, and the past in Ulster literature 1898–1912

As a result, they critiqued Ulster’s nostalgic grappling with history, and mapped out the possibility of alternative and emancipatory political futures. Overall, this thesis will demonstrate that historicising these writers and their work changes our understanding of the relationship between aesthetics, politics, and history in Belfast, Ulster, and Ireland during this period.This project first examines political commitment in the works of Alice Milligan.

Her combination of aesthetics and politics is represented as an attempt to seek out radical political futures using the mythic and historical past. Chapter Two comprises a study of the Ulster Literary Theatre’s literary magazine, Ulaḋ (1904–5). I read it as a modernist ‘little’ magazine for the first time, while also drawing on the framework of regional modernisms.

Chapter Three updates critical paradigms about the modernist bildungsroman through analysis of the novels and autobiographies of Forrest Reid. Reid’s aestheticism and individualism will be explored using the influence of Romantic Hellenism and the aesthetic philosophy of Walter Pater. The final chapter turns to the satirical dramas of Gerald MacNamara, the principal dramatist of the Ulster Literary Theatre.

Using the critical framework of modernist satire/satiric modernism, it argues that MacNamara’s use of humour both critiques and moves beyond the aesthetic and political modes of Revival theatre.<br><br><i>Thesis embargoed until 31 July 2029.</i>