Irish American Fiction from World War II to JFK addresses the concerns of Irish America in the post-war era by studying its fiction and the authors who brought the communities of their youth to life on the page. With few exceptions, the novels studied here are lesser-known works, with little written about them to date. Mining these tremendous resources for the details of Irish American life, this book looks back to the beginning of the twentieth century, when the authors' immigrant grandparents were central to their communities. It also points forward to the twenty-first century, as the concerns these authors had for the future of Irish America have become a legacy we must grapple with in the present.
Author(s): Beth O’Leary Anish
Series: New Directions in Irish and Irish American Literature
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Year: 2021
Language: English
Pages: 217
City: Cham
Preface
Praise for Irish American Fiction from World War II to JFK
Contents
1 Introduction: Memory, History, and the Shaping of the Irish American Present
Anxiety Over Losing the Irish in Irish America
Memory, Forgetting, and the Irish American Experience
Assimilation to the American (Anglo-Protestant) Way
Activism, Conservatism, and the Mid-Twentieth Century American Irish-Catholic Church
2 On Why This Book Should and Should not Begin with Betty Smith’s a Tree Grows in Brooklyn
3 Edward McSorley and Irish America’s Coming of Age
4 A Community Deformed, in Mary Doyle Curran’s The Parish and The Hill
5 “Good Catholic Radicals”: Harry Sylvester’s Moon Gaffney and Irish American Catholicism at Mid-Century
6 How the Other Half Lives: Ellin Berlin’s Lace Curtain
7 John Steinbeck’s Irish Grandfather: Samuel Hamilton, East of Eden, and Post-world War II Irish American Fiction
8 The Last Hurrah for a Way of Life: The Private Side of Edwin O’Connor’s Famous Novel
9 Conclusion: Communities in Jeopardy
Bibliography
Index
