Next up is 2025 BAIS Bursary Prize winner, Paddy Brennan (University of Liverpool). Paddy utilised his bursary to attend and present at conferences and carry out archival research:

The BAIS Bursary Prize allowed me to present two separate papers at two conferences this year, as well as providing me with the chance to carry out archival research which has greatly enhanced my doctoral research. 

Between the 28^th and 30^th of May, I attended the AEDEI conference, ‘The Uses and Abuses of Irishness,’ in Huelva, Spain. Here, I presented a paper titled ‘The Revolution Devours its Children: Starvation and Cannibalism as Metaphors in Irish Fiction.’ This paper was based on an early draft of the second chapter of my thesis, focusing on the fiction of John McGahern and Claire Keegan, so the conference provided a useful forum to receive feedback on work in progress from my peers. More broadly, the conference allowed me to establish international connections in the field of Irish Studies which will doubtless be valuable in the months ahead as I complete my thesis and begin to explore the global options for postdoctoral research available to me. At the conclusion of the conference, the prospect of publishing conference proceedings was also raised, and this too could provide the opportunity to bring my research to a wider audience through publication.

On the 4^th and 5^th September, I attended the Irish Humanities Alliance conference, ‘Feeding the Soul: Transnational Narratives of Food and Belonging,’ at University College Dublin. Here I presented a paper on national chauvinism and transnational solidarity in the depiction of food and hunger in contemporary Irish fiction, focusing predominantly on the works of Colm Tóibín and Frank McCourt. Given that I am completing my doctoral thesis on the topic of food consumption and self-starvation in Irish fiction, this conference was ideally suited to my field of research and allowed me to meet researchers exploring similar themes in other disciplines.

Being in Dublin for the IHA conference also gave me the chance to visit the National Library of Ireland. Here I was able to examine archival material relating to the writer Edna O’Brien, whose works feature prominently in my thesis. Two manuscripts in particular – a screenplay by O’Brien for an unproduced short film about Bobby Sands, and a draft of an unpublished article detailing her experience at a fasting clinic in Spain – proved to be especially apposite to my research

Paddy is a PhD student at the Institute of Irish Studies, University of Liverpool. His research looks at the literary significance of food, its consumption and its rejection in Irish fiction. Spanning from the mid-twentieth century up until the present day, it encompasses a diverse range of authors including Edna O’Brien, John McGahern, Sally Rooney and Niamh Campbell. This research charts how Irish attitudes towards eating and self-starvation alter as Ireland itself transitions from a prevailing culture of Catholic self-denial to being a modern, secular state where conspicuous consumption is rife.

Image from BBC adaptation of Sally Rooney’s Normal People (2020)