ENG 135: Swords into Plowshares: The Power of the Book in the Irish Troubles
Elizabeth Baer, Professor
Gustavus Adolphus College English Department
Goals for the course:
1. Learn about the history and reverence for the book in Ireland
2. Study the history of the Anglo-Irish conflict
3. Explore the use of literature as a tool for resistance, protest and reconciliation
4. Engage with the community through service-learning
5. Help students gain skills for international travel and cross-cultural communication
Ireland is a divided island, part independent nation and part colony of England, which has been a presence in Ireland for 800 years. This presence has caused strife, revolution, oppression, discrimination, the loss of the Gaelic language, religious controversy, and ethnic violence. Ireland is also a country with a long and distinguished history of literature. What role, we will ask, has literature played in the conflict over the centuries? After a weekend in London, we will begin by looking at the history of and the reverence for the book in Ireland since the Middle Ages, examining the illuminated manuscripts and copies of classical texts made by Irish monks. We will visit several libraries to see these ancient texts and talk with librarians. Also on the itinerary in Dublin are the Irish Writers Museum, Kilmainham Jail, and the National Museum. We will ask questions about the role of literature as resistance, protest, and reconciliation in the present conflict and in the peace-making process.
Marsh's Library, built 1701, the first public library in Ireland. Dublin.
Sites to be visited, as we seek to understand the power of the text, will also include a prehistoric burial mound, an ancient monastery, the mansion of a Protestant planter, libraries which are three hundred years old, bookstores, as well as contemporary evidence of “the Troubles”: murals, the so-called Peace wall in Belfast, the site of "Bloody Sunday" in Derry. We will also see plays, meet a contemporary Irish writer, visit pubs which Irish writers frequented, and engage in volunteer work with those dedicated to achieving peace in Northern Ireland. We will read works from some of the following writers: Eavan Boland, Seamus Deane, Seamus Heaney, Jennifer Johnston, Paul Muldoon, Brian Friel, Bernard MacLaverty, and Robert McLiam Wilson. Students will be asked to keep a journal and do a final presentation/project. Time will also be set aside for individual travel as well as reflection on the implications of what we study for one's own beliefs and vocation.

This course is open to all students, including first year students and carries General Education credit for HUMAN and CULTR. English majors can petition for major credit.