“Inventing Eastern Europe” In Ireland, 1848-1918
“Inventing Eastern Europe” In Ireland, 1848-1918

Summary/Abstract: Maria Todorova has warned against assuming a homogeneous view of Eastern Europe among Western Europeans. This article argues that Irish discourse on Eastern Europe was more positive than British discourse in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. While those who supported the closure of the separate Irish parliament in the Act of Union of 1801 echoed the Orientalism dominant in Britain, those who opposed it sympathised with the struggles of subject nations in Central and Eastern Europe for self-determination and even posited a parallel between Ireland and these nations. Irish nationalists were drawn especially to Poland and Hungary, whose political paths seemed to match Ireland’s most closely. They also displayed a distinct preference for the Christian, particularly Catholic, communities of the region. The minority who chose to side with Germany in World War One had to jettison their sympathy for its Polish minority, however, in an effort to justify the alliance. With few opportunities for direct contact, the Irish used Eastern Europe predominantly as a foil for their own political struggles. Thus the main emotion Irish nationalists felt when they observed the establishment of new states in the region by the Paris Treaties of 1919 was envy. Only after fighting the War of Independence from 1919 to 1921 did Irish nationalists have their own state to boast of.

• Details
• Contents