Life
1954- ; b. Cork, ed. Glenstal Abbey School, and UCD; McGill University
(Montreal), and University of Paris; lecturer in Philosophy, UCD; ed.
with Patrick Mark Hederman, The Crane Bag, 1977-1985, to which
he contributed ‘Crisis in Imagination’; ed. The Irish Mind:
Exploring Intellectual Traditions (1984); appt. Professor of Philosophy, UCD; issued Myth
and Motherland (1984), in the Field Day Pamphlet series; also Dialogues
with Contemporary Continental Thinkers (1984); La Poetique du possible
(1984); Modern Movements in European Philosophy (1986); Narratives
of Contemporary Irish Culture (1987); The Wake of Imagination (1988);
Transitions: Narratives in Modern Irish Culture (1988); co-editor
of the Irish Review; contrib. prominently to television and radio
broadcasts; issued Poetics of Modernity (1995), and a novel, Sam’s
Fall (1995); issued Postnationalist Ireland (1996); wrote Walking
at Sea Level (1998), a novel about a hitherto complacent Canadian
academic, John Toland, who undertake the study of his Irish namesake and
is forced to confront his dead twin in the process; issued On Stories
(2001); appt. to Charles Seelig Chair of Philosophy at Boston College.
DIW
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Works
Criticism, ed., Exploring Intellectual Traditions (1984);
Dialogues with Contemporary Continental Thinkers (1984);
Poetique du Possible (Paris 1984); Myth and Motherland [Field
Day Pamplets, No. 5] (Derry: Field Day Co. 1984); ed. The Irish Mind:
Exploring Intellectual Traditions (Dublin: Wolfhound 1984); Movements
in Modern European Philosophy (1985); Transitions: Narratives in
Modern Irish Culture (Manchester UP 1988) [infra];
ed., Across the Frontiers: Ireland in the 1990s (Dublin: Wolfhound
Press 1989), 280pp. [infra]; ed., Migrations:
The Irish at Home and Abroad (Dublin: Wolfhound Press 1990), 122pp.;
ed., States of Mind: dialogues with contemporary thinkers on the European
mind (Manchester UP 1995), 319pp.; Poetics of Modernity (Atlantic
Highlands: Humanities Press 1995); Paul Ricoeur: The Hermeneutics of
Action (Sage 1996), 213pp.; Postnationalist Ireland: Politics,
Literature, Philosophy (London: Routledge 1996), 224[260]pp.; On
Stories [Thinking in action ser.] (London: Routledge 2001, 2002),
xii, 193pp., ill.
Poetry, Angel of Patrick’s Hill (Dublin: Raven Arts Press 1992), 47pp. Fiction, Sam’s Fall (London: Hodder/Sceptre 1995), 236pp.; Walking at Sea Level (London: Sceptre 1998).
Journals (Selected articles:) ‘Tom Murphy’s Long Night's Journey into Night’, in Studies, 72 (1973), pp.327-35 [rep. in Transitions (… &c.)]; ‘Myth and Terror’, in The Crane Bag, Vol. 2, Nos. 1 & 2 (Dublin 1977); ‘Myth as the Bearer of Possible Worlds’ [dialogue with Paul Ricoeur], in The Crane Bag, Vol. 2. Nos. 1 & 2 (1978); ‘A Crisis of the Imagination: An Analysis of a Counter Tradition in the Irish Novel’, in The Crane Bag, Vol. 3, No. 1, (1979), pp.58-70; ‘The IRA’s Strategy of Failure’, in The Crane Bag, Vol. 4, No. 2 (Dublin 1980); ‘Terrorisme et Sacrifice: le cas de Irlande du Nord’, in Esprit [Paris] (April 1979); ‘Between Politics and Literature: The Irish Cultural Journal’, in The Crane Bag, Vol. 7, No. 2 [The Forum Issue: Education, Religion, Arts, Psychology] (1983) pp.160-71; ‘Letters to a New Republic: Three Open Letters to The Presidents’, in Dermot Bolger, Letters from the New Island, Raven Arts 1992, c.p.309; ‘Myth and Modernity in Irish Poetry’, in Elmer Andrews, ed., Contemporary Irish Poetry: A Collection of Critical Essays (London: Macmillan 1996), pp.41-62. Also contrib. to Conleth Ellis and Rita E. Kelly, ed., Poetry Ireland Review, ‘Special Eugene Watters Issue: The Week-End of Dermot and Grace’ (1985).
Bibliographical
details
Across the Frontiers:
Ireland in the 1990s, ed. Richard Kearney (Dublin: Wolfhound
Press 1989), 280pp. CONTENTS: Introduction, ‘Thinking Otherwise’
[7]; Pt. I, Political Perspectives. T. J. Barrington, Frontiers of the
Mind [29]; John Hume, ‘Europe of the Regions’ [45] Michael D.
Higgins, ‘Ireland in Europe in 1992: Problems and Prospects for a
Mutual Interdependency’ [58]; Paul Bew and Henry Patterson, ‘Ireland
in the 1990s - North and South’ [78]; Rosemarie Rowley, ‘Thinking
Globally and Acting Locally’ [91] Desmond Fennell, Towards a World
Community of Communities [99]. Pt II. Social and Economic Perspectives.
Eithne Murphy, ‘Ireland’s Economic Welfare in a Barrier Free
Europe’, [117]; Frank Barry, ‘Pluralism and Community [137];
Ivor Browne, ‘A Granular Society’ [151]; Alan Matthews, ‘The
Role of the European Community’s Structural Funds in the 1990s’
[171]. Pt. III, Cultural Perspectives. Migrant Minds (in conversation
with the editor [185] Paul Hewson [“Bono”] The White Nigger;
Paul Durcan: Passage to Utopia; Neil Jordan: Imagining Otherwise; Robert
Ballagh: Responding; Luke Gibbons, ‘Coming Out of Hibernation?: The
Myth of Modernity in Irish Culture’ [205]; Desmond Bell, ‘Ireland
Without Frontiers? The Challenge of the Communications Revolution’
[219]; Joseph O’Leary, Religion, Ireland: in Mutation [231]. Pt.
IV, International Perspectives. Alberto Moravia, ‘The Debate on European
Cultural Identity. The Cultural Storm’ [241]; Edgar Faure, ‘A
Europe of Regional Cultures’; Wim Wenders, ‘Europe Seen from
Elsewhere’; Edgar Morin, ‘European Cultural Identity’;
Julia Kristeva, ‘The Other Europe’; Georges Duby, ‘The
Case for European Cultural Television’. Jean-François Lyotard,
Notes on the Postmodern Debate (Preview for a New Stage and Svelte Appendix
to the Postmodern Question) [261]; Tom Docherty, ‘Passages to Postmodernism’
[268 ]; Notes on the Contributors. [see Quotations, infra.]
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Criticism
Jeremiah Newman, The State of Ireland
(Cork: Mercier Press 1977).
Ulrich Schneider, ‘Staging History in Contemporary Anglo-Irish Drama: Brian Friel and Frank McGuinness’, in Geert Lernout, ed., The Crows Behind the Plough: History and Violence in Anglo-Irish Poetry and Drama (Amsterdam: Rodopi 1991), pp.85, 92.
Gerry Smyth, The Novel and the Nation: Studies in New Irish Fiction (London: Pluto Press 1997), cites Kearney’s ‘Open Letter to Mary Robinson’ asserting that with her election ‘we have performed, pp. 5, 14, 309.
Gerry Smyth, Decolonisation and Criticism: The Construction of Irish Literature (London: Pluto Press 1998), p.28.
Conor Cruise O’Brien, reviewing The Irish Mind (1985), iin Halliday & Coyle, eds., The Irish Psyche [Special Issue of Irish Journal of Psychology, 15, 2 & 3] 1994, p.317.
John Harrington, The Irish Beckett (Syracuse UP 1991), (p.138.
John Dunne, review of Sam’s Fall in Books Ireland (Sept. 1995), p.216-17. See also notice of States of Mind (1995) in Books Ireland (Oct. 1995), p.259.
John Devitt, review of Sam's Fall, in Irish Literary Supplement (Fall 1995), p.14.
Terence Killen’s review of Richard Kearney, Poetic of Modernity [&c.] (1996), in The Irish Times, 4 May 1996.
Roy Foster review of Postnationalist Ireland (1997), in Times Literary Supplement, (May 1997).
Michael Cronin, Richard Kearney, On Stories (London: Routledge), in The Irish Times [Weekend], 29 Dec. p.9.
Aidan Arrowsmith, ‘Debating Diasporic Identity: Nostalgia, (Post) Nationalism, Critical Traditionalism’, Irish Studies Review, August 1999, p.179; and see further, infra.)
Geraldine Meaney, ‘History Gasps: Myth in Contemporary Irish Women’s Poetry’, in Poetry in Contemporary Irish Literature, ed. Michael Kenneally, 1995, p.100.)
Elmer Andrews, ed., Contemporary Irish Poetry: A Collection of Critical Essays Macmillan 1996, pp.41-62, p.42).
Klaus Gunnar Schneider, ‘Irishness and Postcoloniality in Glenn Patterson’s Burning Your Own, in Irish Studies Review, Vo. 6, No. 1, 1998, pp.55-62, p.56.
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Notes
John Montague: The longer poem “Border Sick Call”, by Montague,
first printed in Fortnight Review (Oct. 1994; pp.48-49), appeared
with editorial material quoted from Richard Kearney: ‘[the] mythological
homeland of Tyrone is [for Montague] a ruined landscape, a ravaged recollection.
If myth can be given voice again, it is only as a testimony to contemporary
homelessness.’
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Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)