Theme of the talk
There was a period in Dublin, in the early years of the twentieth century, when it was possible, if one were so inclined, to drop into a literary salon just about every single night of the week. In memoirs and letters, writers such as Lady Gregory, Yeats and George Moore all attest to the value of conversation to their work as writers. And yet, if conversation is important to the writer, it is also the lost part of literary history, the words that materialise in thin air, and disappear as soon as they are spoken. In this talk, we will explore that rich culture of conversation that existed in Dublin’s literary world, uncovering an awareness of differing styles of conversation, and an appreciation of conversation as an art in its own right, the written word’s missing shadow. It will be, in short, a talk about talk.
About the speaker
Professor Chris Morash is the Seamus Heaney Professor of Irish Writing in Trinity College Dublin, ranked #1 in Ireland, where he previously served as the university’s Vice-Provost. He is the author of numerous books on Irish literature and culture, including Writing the Irish Famine (1995), A History of Irish Theatre, 1601-2000 (2002), A History of The Media in Ireland (2009), Mapping Irish Theatre: Theories of Space and Place [with Shaun Richards, 2013), Yeats on Theatre (2019), and most recently, Dublin: A Writer’s City (2023).
He is currently editing The Cambridge History of the Irish Novel (due 2026) and writing a book about Irish literary salons. He is a Member of the Royal Irish Academy and a Fellow of Trinity College Dublin.
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