'Womanish epistles'? Martha McTier, female epistolarity and late eighteenth-century Irish radicalism

TY - JOUR

T1 - 'Womanish epistles'? Martha McTier, female epistolarity and late eighteenth-century Irish radicalism

AU - Kennedy, C

PY - 2004

Y1 - 2004

N2 - This article examines the epistolary practice of Martha McTier, the sister of the Ulster Presbyterian radical and founding member of the United Irishmen, William Drennan. Drawing on literary analyses of the eighteenth-century epistolary form and Jurgen Habermas's account of the development of the public sphere, it argues that through her personal correspondence McTier was able to construct herself as a political subject, engaging in the oppositional discourse of the radical public sphere. The public reputation which McTier earned as a letter-writer and the fact that her correspondence was subject to government surveillance in the build-up to the 1798 Irish rebellion challenges the designation of the female letter as an essentially private medium, concerned with the personal and domestic, and suggests a more fluid relationship between women, letter-writing and the public and private spheres.

AB - This article examines the epistolary practice of Martha McTier, the sister of the Ulster Presbyterian radical and founding member of the United Irishmen, William Drennan. Drawing on literary analyses of the eighteenth-century epistolary form and Jurgen Habermas's account of the development of the public sphere, it argues that through her personal correspondence McTier was able to construct herself as a political subject, engaging in the oppositional discourse of the radical public sphere. The public reputation which McTier earned as a letter-writer and the fact that her correspondence was subject to government surveillance in the build-up to the 1798 Irish rebellion challenges the designation of the female letter as an essentially private medium, concerned with the personal and domestic, and suggests a more fluid relationship between women, letter-writing and the public and private spheres.

M3 - Article

SN - 0961-2025

VL - 13

SP - 649

EP - 667

JO - WOMENS HISTORY REVIEW

JF - WOMENS HISTORY REVIEW

IS - 4

ER -