Detached Lyricism and Universal Rootedness: A Critical Introduction to the Poetry of Pat Boran
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Villar Argáiz, PilarEditorial
Firenze University Press
Materia
Contemporary Irish Poetry Irish Haikus Masculinity Pat Boran
Date
2019Referencia bibliográfica
Villar-Argáiz, P. (2019). Detached Lyricism and Universal Rootedness: A Critical Introduction to the Poetry of Pat Boran. Studi Irlandesi. A Journal of Irish Studies, 9(9), 547-562.
Abstract
Pat Boran is one of the most versatile, polyvalent and innovative
voices in contemporary Irish poetry. In spite of his prolific career as a
poet, editor, and fiction writer, and the positive reviews his work has
received over the years (i.e. Smith 2007; Linke 2009; Dempsey 2011;
Cornejo 2016; Kehoe 2018), Boran has received very little critical attention
in Irish Studies. This critical introduction intends to cover
this gap in academia, by offering a more detailed critical appraisal
of a poetic voice largely underrated within Irish literary criticism, as
O’Driscoll (2007, xiv-xv) laments in his introduction to his Selected
Poems. In particular, I will offer a brief critical overview of Boran’s six
collections of poetry, and I will concentrate on several aspects which
seem to distinguish him as a writer: his sense of “detached lyricism”
(that is to say, his intensive biographical but at the same time impersonal
style); the importance that local rootedness exerts in his work;
and his idiosyncratic way of handling themes such as masculinity.