compare and contrast their work. Also pro-
vided are a personal statement composed by
each poet as well as a bibliography of each
poet’s work.Fleming, N. C., and Alan O’Day,The Longman Hand-
book of Modern Irish History since 1800, Pearson/Long-
man, 2005.
O’Day and Fleming provide a comprehensive
guide to the political, social, and cultural Irish
history of the nineteenth, twentieth, and early
twenty-first centuries. They devote a special
section to the role of women in Irish history
and additionally include a useful chronology.
Hartman, Charles O.,Free Verse: An Essay on Prosody,
Northwestern University Press, 1996.
In this book, Hartman explores the character-
istics of modern free-verse poetry and argues
that in order to properly appreciate this form,
the idea of prosody—that is, the pattern of
sound and rhythm in poetry—must be rede-
fined. Through his analyses of nonmetered
verse, Hartman provides examples from the
work of early modern and modern free-verse
poets, including T. S. Eliot and John Ashbery.
Villar-Arga ́iz, Pilar,Eavan Boland’s Evolution as an Irish
Woman Poet: An Outsider within an Outsider’s Culture,
Edwin Mellen Press, 2007.
Villar-Arga ́iz analyzes Boland’s development
as a poet, focusing on her awareness of her
status as a woman and as a postcolonial poet.
Boland’s work is viewed in this study from
within the framework of Ireland as a nation
marked as much by outsider status as Boland
brands herself.Outside History