This paper is predicated on an argument for presenting the Irish short story as a statutory recommendation within the A Level English syllabus in Northern Ireland (and also, perhaps, in syllabi set by Examination Boards in other parts of the United Kingdom). Employing a carefully considered literary-critical perspective, the paper offers a…

In evaluating some of Heaney's prose writings about the art of poetry -- what I have called his 'Poetics' -- the paper explores how those ideas could enhance the teaching of poetry in the upper post-primary schools. The paper is divided into four closely interconnected sections. The first section evaluates Heaney's thoughts about the potential…

This paper has two complementary objectives. After providing some theoretical perspectives on fiction generally, and on the teaching of fiction more specifically, it firstly evaluates, from a literary-critical perspective, a reasonably representative selection of the portrayal of teachers and teaching in some twentieth-century Anglo-Irish fiction…