Too smart to be sentimental : contemporary Irish American women writers / edited by Sally Barr Ebest and Kathleen McInerney ; foreword by Caledonia Kearns.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Ebest, Sally Barr.

McInerney, Kathleen H.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

American literature--Irish American authors--History and criticism.

American literature.

American literature--Women authors--History and criticism.

American literature--20th century--History and criticism.

Irish Americans in literature.

Irish Americans--Ethnic identity.

Irish Americans.

American literature--Women authors.

American literature--Irish American authors.

Physical Description:

xiv, 254 pages ; 23 cm

Place of Publication:

Notre Dame, Ind. : University of Notre Dame Press, [2008]

Summary:

In a series of critical and biographical essays, Too Smart to Be Sentimental offers a feminist literary history of twentieth-century Irish America. This collection introduces the reader to the works of twelve contemporary Irish American women writers, some of whom are well known, such as Joyce Carol Oates, Alice McDermott, and Tess Gallagher, and some of whom are equally deserving of recognition.

Each chapter focuses on a particular writer, describes and discusses that writer's most important works, contextualizes the discussion with relevant biographical material, and highlights why the writer is representative of the Irish American literary tradition. Too Smart to Be Sentimental-the first critical study of contemporary Irish American women authors-will be invaluable to students and scholars of Irish studies and Irish American literature.

Contents:

Mary Mccarthy : too smart to be sentimental / Sally Barr Ebest

Maureen Howard's "Landscapes of memory" / Patricia Keefe Durso

Moments of kindness, moments of recognition : the achievement of Maeve Brennan / John M. Menaghan

"Forget about being Irish" : family, transgression, and identity in the fiction of Elizabeth Cullinan / Kathleen McInerney

Alice McDermott's narrators / Beatrice Jacobson

Tess Gallagher : a network of sympathies and distant connections / Mary Ann Ryan

"I'm your man" : Irish American masculinity in the fiction of Joyce Carol Oates / Susana Araújo

Hardly sentimental : the "bad girls" and lonely men of Mary McGarry Morris's fiction / Patricia Gott

Blurring boundaries : Eileen Myles and the Irish American identity / Kathleen Ann Kremins

The world of Mary Gordon : writing from the "other side" / Susanna Hoeness-Krupsaw

Jean McGarry : sojourners between dreams and realities / Amy Lee

Erin McGraw : expanding the tradition of Irish American women writers / Sally Barr Ebest.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780268027735

0268027730

OCLC:

173218797