{"product_id":"fitness-for-freedom-disability-degeneration-and-modern-irish-writing-9780815611929","title":"Fitness for Freedom: Disability, Degeneration, and Modern Irish Writing","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eFitness for Freedom \u003c\/i\u003erevises our reading of Ireland's national story by illuminating the central role of fitness and disability in Irish revivalism and modernism. While notions of disability have been used to justify the denial of citizenship and rights across cultures, Marion Quirici uncovers a history in which an entire nation, Ireland, was characterized as disabled and therefore \"not fit for freedom.\" Beyond symbolism, the Famine and decades of emigration led to a perception that Ireland's racial stocks were depleted, and that those who remained were feeble and few. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eThe fraught relationship between disability and Irishness provides context for Quirici's analysis of modernist Irish literature. She argues that authors working within Irish historical and cultural contexts reclaim degeneration as a principle of creativity, a move that becomes definitive of modernist experimentation. Revivalists such as William Butler Yeats, Lady Gregory, Pádraic Pearse, and the Gaelic Athletic Association created new mythologies of Irish ability to counter imperial stereotypes tacitly reinforcing the idea of disability as a disqualification for sovereignty. Certain Irish modernists, however--James Joyce, Edna O'Brien, Samuel Beckett, Brian O'Nolan, and Christy Brown--called the \"fitness for freedom\" ideology into question. These authors allow us to disentangle disability from unfitness and scrutinize its relationship to liberation. Quirici traces how, in their work, disability becomes an avenue for exploring the human experience and discovering the inherent creativity and collaborative potential of an interdependent life.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Marion Quirici\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBinding Type:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Syracuse University Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 11\/01\/2025\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSeries:\u003c\/b\u003e Irish Studies\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 308\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.2lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 8.50h x 5.90w x 1.00d\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780815611929","brand":"Syracuse University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45089872871561,"sku":"9780815611929","price":69.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0636\/9240\/6921\/files\/img_df9ae2e3-35e3-409d-afd9-4b0b74172dc6.jpg?v=1766477365","url":"https:\/\/sonsanddaughtersbooks.com\/products\/fitness-for-freedom-disability-degeneration-and-modern-irish-writing-9780815611929","provider":"Sons and Daughters Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}