The Belfast Agreement: Twentieth Anniversary Issue

Posted by Jim on March 2, 2019

The Belfast Agreement:
Twentieth Anniversary Issue 
(Vol 10, No 2)

“I get down on my knees and do what must be do
And kiss Achilles’ hand, the killer of my son.”

    Michael Longley,  from “Ceasefire”
Our long-awaited historic issue will be released to the book trade in February. If you wish to receive it immediately, please subscribe now:

http://irishpages.org/subscribe/

Given the all-consuming Brexit crisis, the release of this issue, at this moment, seems perfect timing. Several contributors write powerfully about the interaction of The Belfast Agreement and Brexit. Further work has been sought in light of recent developments. The whole issue will be of high interest to all those in Ireland and Great Britain who are following this interlocking British constitutional crisis. 

The issue consists of 42 notable literary writers, journalists and scholars commenting on the achievement of the Agreement itself as well as offering their views, feelings and experience of it over the past twenty years, including the present moment. The issue has been compiled through a mixture of invitation and public announcement, with most of the contributors from the North, or Northern-based. A certain number, however, are from outside Northern Ireland – the Republic and Great Britain – but these are writers whose work in the past has demonstrated a real interest in, and engagement with, the polity. Most of the writing is non-fiction, but a small amount of poetry, memoir and fiction directly relevant to the issue is included.

Most of the contributors are writers with a literary, journalistic or scholarly track-record, evinced by publication history and critical response. There are no politicians included, and only a number of journalists with book publication. A major consideration is careful balance: by genre of writer, gender, age, background, outlook, county and so forth. As such, given the range of the contributors, the whole issue constitutes a cultural and civic event of considerable contemporaneous relevance to the North, to the whole of Ireland, and to a Great Britain in the throes of Brexit.