Utopias in Times of Crisis: Irish Modernist Literature in the 1920s and 1930s

The project Utopias in Times of Crisis: Irish Modernist Literature in the 1920s and 1930s (UT-MOLI) explores the role of utopianism in Irish modernist literature amidst a period of social, political, and cultural upheaval. Utopianism—the pursuit of an ideal society beyond the constraints of present reality—has gained renewed significance in contemporary discourse, becoming a necessary political and social stance in the twenty-first century, a time of multiple global crises. The early twentieth century in Ireland, marked by the Irish Rising (1916), the War of Independence (1919-1921), the establishment of the Irish Free State (1922), the creation of Northern Ireland (1921), and the eventual abolition of British rule, was a period of great changes. This project investigates how Irish modernist literature of the 1920s and 1930s, a key phase of national and literary redefinition, engages with utopian visions in a time of profound crisis. By examining works by James Joyce, William Butler Yeats, Elizabeth Bowen, and Kate O’Brien, UT-MOLI will analyze how utopianism intersects with themes such as national identity, colonialism, the human-non-human relationship, and feminist/queer thought. By focusing on these intersections, UT-MOLI studies the significant but understudied role utopianism played in shaping Irish modernism, while contributing to broader debates in both utopian and modernist studies.