RT Generic T1 Austin Clarke/Poetry Ireland Library Research Project A1 University College, Dublin. Library. Special Collections A1 Irish Virtual Research Library and Archive (IVRLA) NO Scope and Content: The Austin Clarke/Poetry Ireland Library is a gathering of more than 5,000 volumes, almost all of which were once part of Clarke’s private library and are now housed at UCD Special Collections. Austin Clarke (1896-1974) poet, dramatist and broadcaster, was an important figure in Irish cultural life during the mid-twentieth century. With a literary career that spanned sixty years, Clarke witnessed the birth of the new Irish state and its growth towards modernity. His library reveals not just the kinds of books that Clarke chose to read, but material given to him both in a personal capacity, and in his professional role as a reviewer. Clarke’s reviews were published in major British and Irish publications; they are important not only for what they reveal about the work under scrutiny, but as an indication of the important relationship between cultural production within Ireland and abroad. This project specifically attends to the relationship between Clarke as reader and Clarke as professional reviewer. The collection includes a full shelf list of Austin Clarke’s library, an index of a selection of his published reviews and essays, and digitised copies of a small sample of those reviews together with visual representations of the relevant volumes from his library. One of the most interesting aspects of the library is the evidence it provides of Clarke’s significant awareness of non-Irish material in the genres of both imaginative and critical writing. Working at a time when Ireland was considered insular and often creatively self-absorbed, Clarke’s library index and review samples reveal the eclectic influences that permeated Irish culture and helped to shape the thinking of its writers and artists. It highlights his engagement with cultures beyond Ireland, in particular his interest in variations of language and genre. AN uri:info:fedora/ivrla:22731 UL http://hdl.handle.net/:10151/EAD_0000045_SC LK //digital.ucd.ie/?getObject=ivrla:22731 SL UCD Library, University College Dublin LL Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland Zebra_Session: The table 'session_data' is full