Gaelic revival

Resurgence of interest in Irish language, literature, history, and folklore inspired by the growing Irish nationalism of the early 19th century.

With the 17th-century English conquest and settlement of Ireland, Irish almost disappeared as a literary language. By the mid-19th century, translations of heroic tales from ancient Irish manuscripts led to the popularity, among the educated classes, of poets who wrote in patterns echoing ancient bardic verse. The revival laid the scholarly and nationalistic groundwork for the Irish Literary Renaissance. See also bard.

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▪ Irish literature

      resurgence of interest in Irish language, literature, history, and folklore inspired by the growing Irish nationalism of the early 19th century. By that time Gaelic had died out as a spoken tongue except in isolated rural areas; English had become the official and literary language of Ireland. The discovery by philologists of how to read Old Irish (written prior to 900) and the subsequent translations of ancient Gaelic manuscripts (e.g., The Annals of the Four Masters) made possible the reading of Ireland's ancient literature. Heroic tales caught the imagination of the educated classes. Anglo-Irish poets experimented with verse that was structured according to Gaelic patterns and rhythms and that echoed the passion and rich imagery of ancient bardic verse. In 1842 the patriotic organization known as Young Ireland founded The Nation, a paper that published the works of Thomas Osborne Davis, a master of prose and verse, and of such poets as Thomas D'Arcy McGee, Richard D'Alton Williams, and Speranza (the pseudonym of Lady Wilde, mother of Oscar Wilde) and stirred pride in Irish literary achievements. The Dublin University Magazine (1833–80), another important literary publication, often included the work of James Clarence Mangan, who translated Gaelic poems into English and also wrote original verse in the Gaelic style. Jeremiah John Callanan was the first to use the Gaelic refrain in English verse, and Sir Samuel Ferguson wrote epic-like poetry recalling Ireland's heroic past. Thomas Moore, Charles Maturin, and Maria Edgeworth also incorporated Irish themes from earlier Gaelic works into their writings.

      The Gaelic revival was not a widespread, vigorous movement because political nationalism and the need for land reform overshadowed cultural nationalism. The revival did, however, lay the scholarly and nationalistic groundwork for the Irish literary renaissance (q.v.), the great flowering of Irish literary talent at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century.

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