This book explores representations of traditional medicine and healing practices in Irish Revival-era literature spanning from the late nineteenth century to the early twentieth century. Specifically, the book focuses on the work of William Butler Yeats, Lady Augusta Gregory, and John Millington Synge. The author examines folk medical practices and analyses how folk medicine appears in literature, bringing to light fresh contexts and materials including diaries, letters, folklore collections, and medical texts. By writing the first book to explore the place of traditional medicine in Irish literature, Walker-Dunseith sheds light on a distinctive area of Irish life and practice that gestures towards the possibility of a culture and nation in the act of healing itself and questioning nationalistic discourses.

Discusses the Irish Literary Revival from a medical humanities perspective Emphasizes how the metaphorical significance of folk medicine is inextricable from wider political tensions in Ireland Focuses on writers whose work was motivated by a vision of what Ireland and the world could be

Autorentext

Holly May Walker-Dunseith received her PhD in Irish Literature and Medical Humanities from University College Cork, Ireland.

Inhalt

Chapter 1- Introduction.- Section 1.- W. B. Yeats The Search for the Land of the Young.- Chapter 2- A Wandering Path to Recovery The Wanderings of Oisin (1889).- Chapter 3- Thoor Ballylee Healing and Recovery.- Section 2- Augusta Gregory From Colonies to Cough Medicines.- Chapter 4- Rejuvenation, Medicine, and Revival in the Works of Augusta Gregory.- Chapter 5- The Language of Healing Herbs.- Section 3- J. M. Synge: Wells, Wellness and Well-Being.- Chapter 6- Synge and Congestion The Respiratory System of the West.- Chapter 7- Healing Wells in the Work of J. M. Synge.- Chapter 8- Conclusion.