Current PhD Students

Mikelyn Rochford

Thesis Title:

Extricating the Work of Flann O;Brien, Seán O'Casey, Brendan Behan and Pádraic Ó Conaire from Narrative Theory's Normative Realist Assumptions.

Supervisor:

Professor Richard Walsh

Description:

My doctoral research focuses upon the works of twentieth-century Irish novelists and playwrights such as Flann O’Brien, Seán O’Casey, Brendan Behan, and Pádraic Ó Conaire. Through analysis of the works of these authors, I aim to confront the ways that narrative theory's existing theoretical paradigms obscure these texts' cultural traditions and formulate them as contingent upon a realist standard. For example, narratologists have interpreted Flann O’Brien’s work as an example of “unnatural narrative,” a term proposed in order to counter narrative theory’s tendency to privilege realist texts as the assumed norm. However, the existing terms for these works including “unnatural” have been formulated in the negative or as oppositional, which further enforces the biases that these theorists are attempting to combat.

Using the stated authors as a case study, my research reorients the discussion around these texts to extricate them from narrative theory’s hierarchical binaries that have constrained their critical conversation to instead focus on the literary and cultural lineage that they have progressed from. This research will engage with both novels and plays, focusing on moments of metanarrative, transgressions between storyworlds, comedy, logical and spatial impossibility, and the use of myth.

I hold an MA in English from the University of Idaho and a BA in Literature from Pacific University. Broadly, my research interests are in narrative theory, Irish literary studies, postmodernism and comedy. I also have a background in studio art and am interested in the intersection of visual art and narrative. My studio work has appeared in Silk Road Review: A Literary Crossroads, Cascadia Rising Review and on the cover of Atticus Review.