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Music, the moving image and Ireland, 1897–2017

formal analysis of Mayne’s short fiction. The entire first section of essays is really quite admirable to this end, and collectively, these contributions are well worth seeking out. Surprisingly, then, the collection features some of its own gaps worth conjecturing over. Given the increased interest in transnational or international approaches to Irish literary studies, the essays in this collection largely take up national parameters – though, of course, not exclusively. One example of a more international perspective can be found in Daniel Curran’s treatment of Thomas MacGreevy as a modernist war-time poet. Nevertheless, a feeling persists that perhaps one or two more comparative works with writers of other nationalities might have helped illustrate the vast networks of modernist writing connecting Irish letters with other literary cultures. And while questions over transnational networks might be perhaps more a consideration of interest than anything else, a relative lack of diversity when it comes to language is a more pressing matter. Eoin Byrne’s fine comparison of Máirtín Ó Cadhain’s short fiction with that of Samuel Beckett offers the only extensive treatment of Irish-language writing in the collection, although Jack Fennell’s essay on genre fiction includes sections on Pádraig Ó Séaghda’s Eoghan Paor and the short stories of Seosamh Ó Torna. Given the recent attention being paid to Irish language modernism, this seems like a bit of a missed opportunity. I suppose all this leads to my own conjecture in relation to Irish Modernisms: what critical caché is being sought through the category of modernism? I ask this question not by way of critique but rather in the spirit of possibilities. Laura Lovejoy’s excellent essay prompts this kind of questioning by suggesting the need to reconsider how modernism has come to be defined; Lovejoy contends that in order to welcome the likes of Liam O’Flaherty under the umbrella of modernism, our remit of the category must be expanded. Yet there might also be more disruptive ways of approaching this issue of taxonomy: do writers like Liam O’Flaherty challenge existing definitions of modernism, or do they interrogate the very usefulness of modernism as a continued locus of critical study? The success of Irish Modernisms in many ways rests in how willingly the contributors and editors allow for such repudiations to be a part of the larger project’s exploration of possible horizons. To that end, Irish Modernisms largely achieves what it set out to do; this is a collection of essays that provokes the imagination to future reading and future criticism.