The Best Are Leaving
The Best Are Leaving
Clair Wills's The Best Are Leaving is an important and wide-ranging study of post-war Irish emigrant culture. Wills analyses representations of emigrants from Ireland and of Irish immigrants in Britain across a range of discourses, including official documents, sociological texts, clerical literature, journalism, drama, literary fiction, and popular literature and film. This book, written by a leading critic of Irish literature and culture, examines public opinion about post-war emigration from Ireland and about the immigrant community in Britain by discussing topics such as the loss of the finest people from rural Ireland and the destruction of traditional communities; the anxieties of women emigrants and their desire for the benefits of modern consumer society; the stereotype of the drunken Irishman; the charming and authentic country Irish in the city; and the ambiguous meanings of Irish Catholicism in England, which was viewed as both a threatening and civilising force. Wills explores this theme of emigration through writers as diverse as M. J. Molloy, John B. Keane, Tom Murphy, and Edna O'Brien.
- Presents the most up-to-date scholarship in the field
- Explores the theme of emigration through a diverse range of authors and artists
- Applies an interdisciplinary approach to the subject of Irish emigration
Reviews & endorsements
"Sharp and illuminating … [Wills'] study is deeply impressive in the scope of its learning and the range of its sympathies."
Sunday Business Post
"A fine study of an absorbing subject."
Irish Mail on Sunday
'… Wills has written a thoughtful, open-minded and lucid book that shows that the 'great silence' which enveloped commentary on the Irish language in independent Ireland often characterized the emigrant experience too. One of the most moving and beautiful aspects of this compelling narrative is Wills’s account of her own mother and of her attempts to negotiate for her family between two exacting cultures. She succeeded magnificently - and one outcome is this valuable and necessary book.' Breac
'[This] book … brings to the forefront an often overlooked era in twentieth-century Irish culture … [the author shows us] that this period of departure and radical social change deserves the same rigorous engagement that so frequently attends to global political concerns and earlier twentieth-century periods in Ireland … Wills’ focus brings insight and originality born from top-notch research throughout the book.' Maria McGarrity, Irish Literary Supplement
Product details
February 2015Hardback
9781107048409
218 pages
237 × 159 × 18 mm
0.46kg
8 b/w illus.
Available
Table of Contents
- 1. The best are leaving: fitness, marriage, and the crisis of the national family
- 2. Pink witch: women, modernity, and urbanisation
- 3. British paddies: realism and the Irish immigrant
- 4. The vanishing Irish: assimilation, ethnicisation, and literary caricature
- 5. Clay is the flesh: looking at manual labour.
