Conclusion: Feminism After Poetry

Abstract

Theinová argues that in its time scope and broad thematic material, Irish women’s poetry of the past fifty years documents the Kristevan concept of the natural and necessary transformation of feminist foci over time and generations. Theinová shows how the younger poets in Ireland have often taken up feminist themes and combined them with environmental and social critique as well as with considerations of language and identity. The latest poetic output is best understood as another transitory stage in the development of Irish poetry that reflects the current situation as much as the second- and third-wave feminism did in the twentieth century. This focus on continuities rather than fissures between poetic generations enables a fundamental critical reconsideration of major late twentieth-century Irish women poets and, by extension, the nation’s canon.