St Mary’s Research Fellow to Speak at House of Commons

Dr Keith Hopper, Research Fellow for the Centre for Irish Studies at St Mary’s University College, Twickenham, has been invited to speak at the House of Commons as part of the Irish Writers’ Week. Irish Writers’ Week is organised by the Irish Cultural Centre Hammersmith in association with Irish Arts UK and provides an organised platform for Irish writers, bringing them to the attention of London’s wide audience. Dr Hopper, who also teaches Literature and Film Studies at Oxford University, recently published The Short Fiction of Flann O’Brien (Dalkey Archive Press, 2013) with co-editor Neil Murphy. To mark its publication, Dr Hopper will deliver this talk, which explores the challenges and the pleasures of editing O’Brien’s work. There will also be readings from the anthology by some special guests. The new book features a selection of O’Brien’s most important short stories, as well as the text of his last unfinished novel, Slattery’s Sago Saga. It also includes new translations of several stories originally published in Irish, along with some other rare pieces that have been collected in this book for the first time. The free public event, organised by the Irish Cultural Centre, Hammersmith, is being held on Tuesday 8^th October at 7.30pm in the House of Commons. Although the event is free, places are limited and booking essential. Please email info@irishculturalcentre.co.uk. Post-event review: We wish to express our gratitude to Chris Ruane MP and Martin Collins, of the All Party Parliamentary Group on the Irish in Britain, for hosting the lecture. Thanks also to Catherina Casey, Director of Irish Writers’ Week, and Kelly O’Connor, General Manager of The Irish Cultural Centre, Hammersmith, for organising the event. About the book: ‘The editors call their collection “an initial act of recovery rather than a completist project,” but it comprises a significant chunk of O’Brien’s scattered œuvre’ (New Yorker); ‘The variety taken together displays a playful, sardonic voice that is charmingly self-conscious in its invention’ (Publishers Weekly); ‘a gleeful miscellany’ (Wall Street Journal); ‘The editors… have done a thorough and conscientious job’ (Guardian); ‘In so lovingly collecting and editing Flann O’Brien’s widely scattered and almost forgotten short fiction, Keith Hopper and Neil Murphy have done the study of Irish literature a great service’ (New York Times).