Reading Paul Howard: The Art of Ross O’Carroll Kelly offers a thorough examination of narrative devices, satirical modes, cultural context and humour, in Howard’s texts. The volume argues that his academic critical neglect is due to a classic bifurcation in Irish Studies between high and popular culture, and will use the thought of Pierre Bourdieu, Sigmund Freud, Mikhail Bakhtin and Jacques Derrida to critique this division, building a theoretical platform from which to examine the significance of Howard’s work as an Irish comic and satirical writer. Addressing both the style and the substance of his work, this text locates him in a tradition of Irish satirical writing that dates back to the Gaelic bards, and includes writers like Swift, Wilde, Flann O’Brien and Joyce. Through textual and contextual analysis, this book makes the case for Howard as a significant and original voice in Irish writing, whose fusion of the three traditional types of satire (Horatian, Juvenalian and Menippean), has created a parallel Ireland that shines a satirical light on its real counterpart. As Freud suggests, humour is a way of accessing aspects of the psyche that normative discourses cannot enunciate, and Howard, through the confessional voice of Ross, offers a fictive truth on twenty years of Irish society, a truth that is not accessed by discourse in the public sphere or by what could be termed literary or high cultural fiction.

This collection examines the Irish economic phenomenon of the Celtic Tiger and the financial disaster that came in its wake, from a socio-cultural perspective. It focuses on how these financial developments have been reflected in writing, film and culture in order to offer a more rounded analysis of the effects of this momentous period on people’s lives. Employing a wide range of cultural lenses, the book critiques the cultural, political and aesthetic implications of the progression from prosperity to austerity and the impact this has had on the psyche of Irish culture. An eclectic mix of theoretical approaches enables treatment of religion, literature, popular culture, photography, gastronomy, music, gender, immigration and film, as contributors assess how the Celtic Tiger was represented, or misrepresented, in these particular spheres of experience. In addition, the chapters also probe the effects on all of the aforementioned cultural forms, and interrogate how the lives of people have been transformed in ways that go beyond the already well-documented areas of economics and finance. The book will be a valuable resource for academics and students interested in contemporary Ireland and recent Irish history, as well as the general reader anxious to understand the effects of this particular period on the real lives of people as expressed through culture. It features contributions by internationally acknowledged experts in their fields and offers a comprehensive overview of the cultural consequences of the Celtic Tiger and its aftermath.

This is the latest instalment of the misadventures of Ross O'Carroll-Kelly - a hysterical satire of beer, bonking and rugby!

The multiplicity of interpretations available in the word ‘passages’ is engaged with in this collection of essays that perceptively navigate the ideas of literal and metaphorical crossings, sites of liminality and interstitial zones, the traversal of boundaries and the complex notion of rites and rights of passage. This passages topic is elucidated through discussions on writers as diverse as James Joyce and the Palestinian poet Tawfīq Sāyigh and genres that include the novel, short story, poetry and drama. The diversity of texts is matched by a diversity of theoretical readings that stimulate debate around central ideas such as: how are old texts revisited and re-imagined in the context of new theories? How do contemporary texts re-appropriate the past to critically appraise the present? How is identity renegotiated in cross-cultural texts and in translations? The combination of close textual readings with broader philosophical and cultural deliberations allows for a vigorous examination of texts and theories. The authors, in capturing the cultural moment of their work while acknowledging the ongoing movement of the texts and theory, allow the reader to both contextualise the work and recognise the creative evolution of ideas that are simultaneously at play. Academically orientated, this collection is essential reading for anyone interested in changing theoretical ideas and how they are re-invigorating a reading of literature. It will be of interest especially to students and scholars of English literature, philosophy and cultural studies. Its close textual analysis and multiple perspectives will also make it a very useful classroom text in the aforementioned areas.

This is another instalment of the misadventures of Ross O'Carroll-Kelly - a hysterical satire of beer, bonking and rugby!

Provides an overview of a dynamic and rapidly growing area with a widely applied methodology. This handbook covers the historical development of the field and its growing influence and application in other areas. It is suitable for advanced undergraduates and postgraduates.