The Weekend of Dermot & Grace: Eugene R. Watters’ Long Modernist Poem

• Thesis title in Czech: The Weekend of Dermot & Grace: Dlouhá modernistická báseň Eugena R. Watterse
• Thesis title in English: The Weekend of Dermot & Grace: Eugene R. Watters’ Long Modernist Poem
• Key words: Eugene Rutherford Watters, Eoghan Ó Tuairisc, modernismus, atomová bomba, Hirošima, dlouhá modernistická báseň, The Week-End of Dermot and Grace, “Aifreann na Marbh”
• English key words: Eugene Rutherford Watters, Eoghan Ó Tuairisc, modernism, atomic bomb, Hiroshima, long modernist poem, The Week-End of Dermot and Grace, “Aifreann na Marbh”
• Academic year of topic announcement: 2014/2015
• Thesis type: diploma thesis
• Thesis language: angličtina
• Department: Department of Anglophone Literatures and Cultures (21-UALK)
• Supervisor: Mgr. Radvan Markus, Ph.D.
• Author: hidden - assigned and confirmed by the Study Dept.
• Date of registration: 22.05.2015
• Date of assignment: 22.05.2015
• Administrator's approval: not processed yet
• Confirmed by Study dept. on: 27.05.2015
• Date and time of defence: 06.09.2016 09:00
• Date of electronic submission: 13.08.2016
• Date of proceeded defence: 06.09.2016
• Submitted/finalized: committed by student and finalized
• Opponents: Mgr. Daniela Theinová, Ph.D.

Guidelines

The oeuvre of the Irish poet, novelist, playwright and essayist Eugene Rutherford Watters (later publishing under the name Eoghan Ó Tuairisc), which includes works of numerous forms and genres in both English and Irish, has been mostly neglected by literary criticism. This thesis will focus on Watters’ ambitious long modernist poem The Week-End of Dermot and Grace published in 1964, which have so far been given only perfunctory critical treatment. Formally, The Weekend shows clear affinity with the works of high modernism (especially with the poetry of T.S. Eliot) by poly- and multivocal qualities of Watters’ overtly allusive language and the liberal employment of wide-ranging intertextual references. On the thematic level, the poem centres around Watters’ preoccupation with the dropping of the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima on 6th August 1945 by the American forces, a momentous event that impelled the poet to questions about faith, civilisation, technology and collective guilt in the context of the Irish neutral stance during the Second World War and which also led him to contemplate the role of the poet and poetry in the modern “atomic age”.
Given the aforementioned qualities of the work, the method chosen for the analysis will consist of a close reading of the poem in the light of the historical, literary and biographical background and will take form in a section-by-section detailed commentary, which will also represent the core of the thesis. An account of the author’s life will accompany the analysis (mainly in order to elucidate certain aspects of Watters’ personal philosophy) together with a brief survey of the historical and literary context in which the work originated. A section will be also dedicated to the assessment of The Weekend in the context of the author’s other work, both in English and Irish. Special attention will be paid to the close relationship between The Weekend and its Irish counterpart Aifreann na Marbh (1964, Requiem Mass). The estimated outcome of this thesis will thus consist mainly in a coherent critical assessment of the poem, but it will also attempt to reassess Watters’ poetic work both in the context of Irish literature and in the tradition of European modernist poetry and provide a solid basis for future research into Watters’ / Ó Tuairisc’s poetry.

References

Ó Tuairisc, Eoghan. Lux Aeterna. Baile Átha Cliath: Allen Figgis, 1964.
Watters, Eugene R. The Week-End of Dermot and Grace. Dublin: Allen Figgis, 1964.

De Angelis, Irene. “Tu n’as Rien Vu à Hiroshima.” The Japanese Effect in the Contemporary Irish Poetry. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012.
Goodby, John. Irish Poetry Since 1950: From Stillness into History. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2000.
Kearney, Colbert. “Ar Thóir na Tóraíochta: The Week-End of Dermot and Grace.” Comhar 44.10 (1985): 34-40.
Kearney, Colbert. “Between Birth and Birth, Lux Aeterna.” Poetry Ireland Review 13 (1985): 90-110.
Lucy, Seán. “Comes the Experiment.” Poetry Ireland Review 13 (1985): 72-89.
Mac an tSaoir, Flann, “Tóraíocht na Foirme.” Comhar 24.5 (1965): 27-31.
Mac Craith, Mícheál. “From Celtic Myth to Atom Bomb: A Poetic Response to Hiroshima.” Studia Celtica Japonica 7 (1995): 1-8.
McCabe, James. “Hiroshima: Eoghan Ó Tuairisc and World War II.” New Hibernia Review 9.1 (2005): 117-40.
Nic Eoin, Máirín. Eoghan Ó Tuairisc: beatha agus saothar. Baile Átha Cliath: An Clóchomhar, 1988.
Ní Ghairbhí, Róisín. An tSiobairne idir dhá theanga: Saothar Beirt Scríbhneoirí Dátheangacha, Michael Hartnett agus Eoghan Ó Tuairisc. Diss. NUI Galway. 2004.
Ó Tuairisc, Eoghan. ‘Religio Poetae’ agus Aistí eile. Eag. Máirín Nic Eoin. Baile Átha Cliath: An Clóchomar, 1987.
Wills, Clair. That Neutral Island. London: Faber and Faber, 2000.