Ironies of Art/Tragedies of Life: Essays on Irish Literature (Polish Studies in English Language and Literature) - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0820477842 ISBN 13: 9780820477848

Publisher: Peter Lang Publishing, 2005

Synopsis

In Plato's Symposium, Socrates says that the true poet must be tragic and comic at the same time, and the whole of human life must be felt as a blend of tragedy and comedy. The present collection of essays investigates the presence of comic and tragic elements in Irish literature. The works by Irish authors, be they classical or contemporary, capture the struggles of the lives of individuals and communities in Ireland. Irish literature in various ways deals with the tragic and complex past of the country, as well as an equally interesting present. The irony of the art is always subliminally filled with tragic overtones. Irish literature most commonly presents life's ironies as inseparably linked with the personal tragedies of the characters. In literature, life is sometimes described, sometimes reflected in a distorted mirror. In reality, just as Plato claims, Irish literature appears as a blend of tragedy and comedy.

About this title

About the Author

Liliana Sikorska, Ph.D. in 1994, D. Litt. in 1996; visiting scholar at the University of Florida, Brown University and the University of California, Los Angeles; visiting professor at the American University, Washington, DC; author or co-author of seven books on medieval English and Irish literature; head of the Department of English Literature and Literary Linguistics and acting head of the American Literature Department at the School of English at Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznan, Poland.

About this edition

• Publisher: Peter Lang Publishing
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 0820477842
• ISBN 13: 9780820477848
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 300
• Editor: Sikorska Liliana, Fisiak Jacek