are subjected to the possibility of difference.^12 In this way, it is
History as a continuum that is outside ënow timeí as it attempts to
create a homogenous narrative of tradition and progress. Comparably,
Bolandís notion of ëoutside Historyí draws on the possibility of a
heterogeneous herstorical materialism where herstory is not myth-
ologized in terms of ëHistoryí or the singular. ëOutside Historyí is
therefore the place where history or herstory really happens. In this
way ëOutside Historyí does not anticipate a utopian flight beyond the
ërealí but rather the possibility of the ërealí. Bolandís poetry does not
reiterate Kristevaís theory point by point, but it is noticeable how her
sense of ënow timeí is also represented as being ëoutside Historyí as
myth, and represented in terms of excess and a neglected female body
that is marked by the passages of time.
The fusion of the feminine and the national is explored in
Bolandís poem from Outside History entitled ëThe Making of an Irish
Goddessí (pp.150ñ2). In this poem the mythological mother figure of
Ceres is positioned beyond secular time:
Ceres went to hell
with no sense of time.When she looked back
all that she could see was [Ö]a seasonless, unscarred earth.The speaker in the poem claims: ëBut I need time ñ í. The space
inhabited by Ceres is a mythological and sacred time ñ a story rather
than a reality. However, the body of the poetic speaker is scarred by
ërealí time with ëthe marks of childbirthí; ërealí time is associated with
the womanís body as in Kristevaís theorization. Whether we agree
with Kristevaís theory of womenís time or not, there are points of
comparison between Bolandís figure of Ceres and Kristevaís theory of
how women are positioned as subjects in monumental time, and in
relation to History as a linear narrative.
For instance, when Ceres looks at the ësilver in the rockí, she
conceives of the rock in terms of the body noticing its ëarteries of
12 Kristeva, ëWomenís Timeí, p.192.