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Religious discourse has become alien to the secular and skeptical western societies of the twentieth century. There is real discomfort when religious discourse appears either in the popular press or in society. But even in a secular society, there is still a psychological need (one might even use the stronger word will), if not to believe, then at least to hope. Dr. Filmer states this need is met in the literature of fantasy.

A rich body of mythology and literature has grown around the Celtic ritual known as the Feis of Tara or “marriage of sovereignty”—ancient ceremonies in which the future king pledges to care for the land and serve the goddess of sovereignty. Seamus Heaney, whose writing has attracted the overwhelming share of critical attention directed toward contemporary Irish poetry, has engaged this symbolic tradition in some of his most significant—and controversial—work.

Seamus Heaney and the Emblems of Hope explores Heaney’s use of the family of sovereignty motifs and redresses the imbalance of criticism that has overemphasized the theme of sacrifice to the detriment of more optimistic symbols. Moreover, Moloney reviews the development of the marriage motif in Irish poetry from the ninth to the twenty-first centuries with a focus on Heaney’s adaptations from The Frenzy of Sweeney and The Midnight Court and on the work of such poets as Kinsella, Montague, Boland, and Ní Dhomhnaill. Karen Marguerite Moloney examines the central role that Heaney assigns the Feis of Tara in his response to the crisis of Ulster and to the general spiritual bankruptcy of our times, showing in his verse how the relationship of the male lover to the goddess—particularly in her more repugnant guises—serves as prototype for the humility and deference needed to repair the effects of English colonization of Ireland and, by extension, centuries of worldwide patriarchal abuse.

Through close, sustained readings of poems previously overlooked or misinterpreted, such as “Ocean’s Love to Ireland,” “Come to the Bower,” and “Bone Dreams”—poems that Irish feminist critics have deemed flawed and distressingly sexist—Moloney refutes views that have long stood unchallenged. She also considers the direction of Heaney’s more recent poems, which continue to resonate to the twin demands of conscience and artistic integrity.

An impeccably researched and immensely readable work, Seamus Heaney and the Emblems of Hope reveals that Heaney’s poetry offers a reverence for archetypal femininity and Dionysian energy that can counter the sterility and violence of postcolonial Irish life. Moloney shows us that, in the tradition of poets who preceded him, Heaney turns to the marriage of sovereignty to encode a message for our times—and to offer up emblems of hope on behalf of us all.

Food is more than simple sustenance. It feeds our minds as well as our bodies. It nurtures us emotionally as well as physically. It holds memories. In fact, one of the surprising consequences of globalization and urbanization is the expanding web of emotional attachments to farmland, to food growers, and to place. And there is growing affection, too, for home gardening and its “grow your own food” ethos. Without denying the gravity of the problems of feeding the earth’s population while conserving its natural resources, Seeds of Resistance, Seeds of Hope reminds us that there are many positive movements and developments that demonstrate the power of opposition and optimism.
 
This broad collection brings to the table a bag full of tools from anthropology, sociology, genetics, plant breeding, education, advocacy, and social activism. By design, multiple voices are included. They cross or straddle disciplinary, generational, national, and political borders. Contributors demonstrate the importance of cultural memory in the persistence of traditional or heirloom crops, as well as the agency exhibited by displaced and persecuted peoples in place-making and reconstructing nostalgic landscapes (including gardens from their homelands). Contributions explore local initiatives to save native and older seeds, the use of modern technologies to conserve heirloom plants, the bioconservation efforts of indigenous people, and how genetically modified organisms (GMOs) have been successfully combated. Together they explore the conservation of biodiversity at different scales, from different perspectives, and with different theoretical and methodological approaches. Collectively, they demonstrate that there is reason for hope.