Global Engagement

When Mary Beckett wrote Give Them Stones in 1987, the Troubles novel about conflict in Northern Ireland was already a well-established genre. However, the genre was known primarily for the work of male authors; the only other Troubles novel by a woman was No Mate for the Magpie (1985) by Frances Molloy. Beckett’s Give Them Stones was met with acclaim before falling out of print. It has only been in recent decades that a younger generation of writers have begun to tell the story of how women experienced the Troubles. And yet, more recent novels, and the academic literary establishment, usually ignore the religious dimension both in the political struggle itself and in the novels that depict it.

Beckett’s novel tells the story of an ordinary working-class woman on Belfast’s back streets who is concerned only with keeping her family alive until she is called upon to stand up against violence on both sides of the political divide. She does so not because she has become politicized, but because her religious faith gives her courage. Give Them Stones is now back in print as part of the Catholic Women Writers Series with Catholic University of America Press, edited by Bonnie Lander Johnson and Julia Meszaros. In this talk, Downing College Fellow and Associate Professor Bonnie Lander Johnson will explore the book’s overlooked religious dimensions and make the case for restoring Beckett’s work to the literary canon.