The Question of Irish Identity in the Writings of William Butler Yeats and James Joyce

This study seeks to redefine the notions of Irishness and of Irish identity which have been current in cultural and socio-political discourse since the beginning of this century, and secondly, it offers readings of the work of William Butler Yeats and James Joyce which demonstrate their similar negative epistemologies of identity. It is part of the work’s argument that cultural and aesthetic writings have seminal influences on the political infrastructure of the modern nation, and so the book analyzes the political import of cultural and literary movements. In what is possibly the first such project in terms of Irish studies, it offers a critique of essentialist and foundationalist views of Irishness as Gaelic, Catholic, and nationalist, through the application of the theoretical writings of Theodore Adorno, Jacques Derrida, and Emmanuel Levinas. Given the current conflicts of identity in Northern Ireland, this is a timely study which sheds light on the mindsets which create mutually exclusive notions of identity.