Crosscurrents Conference: Abstract

In April 18-20th 2008 Strathclyde University will be holding the 7th annual Crosscurrents conference which is funded by the AHRC Centre for Irish and Scottish Studies. The conference provides a forum for postgraduates and research fellows who are working in the field of Scottish and/or Irish Studies. My abstract to present at this conference has been accepted. I would be interested to know what you think about my re-reading of Flann O'Brien's text At Swim-Two-Birds from a postcolonial perspective and if you agree that the subaltern subject has agency to define themselves and write back their own historiography.

Crosscurrents Abstract (278 words)

Title of Paper: Subaltern politics and metafiction in Flann O’Brien’s At Swim-Two-Birds.

There is a consensus within academia that Flann O’Brien’s novel At Swim-Two-Birds (1939) is a key example of playful and sophisticated metafiction. Unlike his Irish language novel An Béal Bocht (1941), At Swim-Two-Birds has received little critical attention within the area of Irish postcolonial research because of these postmodern elements. My interest lies in understanding how instances of subalternity are grounded in the novel’s metafiction. This interest investigates what politics of identity can be found in the novel’s stylistic strategies if it is read within the light of postcolonial theories, particularly in relation to the work of the Subaltern Studies Group. I would argue that O’Brien asserts the right of Irish citizens to linguistic and cultural self-determination by negotiating their own narratives. This paper will fall into three parts. Firstly, this paper will offer a brief literature review of the novel’s critical reception to highlight the need to re-assess his metafiction within postcolonial studies. Secondly, through close textual analysis I will demonstrate that O’Brien encourages subaltern minorities, such as the working class within post-independence Ireland, to achieve greater creative power through parody of dominant discourses and the production of fragmented narratives. I will concentrate on episodes where characters conspire to end the despotism of their author and re-write the narratives that they are forced to exist in. Finally, I will argue against Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak’s assertion that the subaltern subject cannot gain agency through writing their own narrative. In contrast to this, I argue that O’Brien encourages his reader to reflect on the construction of postcolonial experiences by offering a series of manipulations and reactions to social and cultural subjectivities enforced by dominant narratives in the Irish state.