Twenty-first-century Irish literature is increasingly preoccupied with environmental crisis: biodiversity loss, flooding, species extinction, and energy insecurity recur across drama, fiction, and poetry. Yet rather than succumbing to despair, many Irish writers articulate a form of grounded hope –  a hope that is expressed not as prediction but as practice, rooted in locally-focused action and the agency of ordinary lives. Through readings of Marina Carr’s The Boy, Claire Keegan’s Small Things Like These, Paula Meehan’s The Solace of Artemis, and Carys Coburn’s Hothouse, this paper argues that contemporary Irish writing imagines environmental futures by sustaining hope as an ethical practice, negotiating a path between naïve optimism and apocalyptic fatalism.

For more Information about this Guest Lecture see: https://www.aau.at/en/english/klagenfurt-centre-of-irish-studies/kcis-guest-lectures/

Regie: Ing. Egmont Sparouz

Kamera: Ing. Egmont Sparouz

Dauer: ca. 54 min.