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A NEW book by Mary Immaculate College academic and Kilshanny resident, Dr Sarah O’Brien, tells the stories of Irish immigrants in post-Famine America. Of Memory and the Misplaced draws from 30 memoirs written between 1900 and 1970 and shows the prevalence of intimate and taboo themes in ordinary immigrants’ writing, such as domestic violence, same-sex love and famine-induced trauma. Combining literary and historical theory, Of Memory and the Misplaced highlights voices that have traditionally been silenced and offers a rare and unexplored collection of primary source autobiographical texts to better understand the experiences of Irish immigrants in the United States. “In the early twentieth century, memoir-writing was a craze in the US. It became fashionable for older people to write down their life stories,” she said. “Luckily, some of the memoirs written by Irish emigrants during this era survived. They offer a rare glimpse into the remembering mind of those who left after the Famine. “The memoirs I write about …
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