In this volume of essays a group of historians and literary critics debate the representation of early modern Ireland by English Renaissance authors. The contributions deal both with modes of representation aesthetic, geographic, literary, political, visual and with the biographies of representative individuals. Thus historical commentary and textual analysis go hand-in-hand with biography and chronology. The essays are interdisciplinary, combining traditional methods of literary and historical enquiry with a range of new theoretical approaches to texts and their authors. There are...

Nationalism is a particularly slippery subject to define and understand, particularly when applied to early modern Europe. In this collection of essays, Brendan Bradshaw provides an insight into how concepts of nationalism and national identity can be understood and applied to pre-modern Ireland. Drawing upon a selection of his most provocative and pioneering essays, together with three entirely new pieces, the limits and contexts of Irish nationalism are explored and its impact on both early modern society and later generations, examined. The collection reflects especially upon the emergence...