This course examines how Northern Irish writers have represented the Troubles and its aftermath, tracing literature’s response to sectarian violence, communal divide, and the process of peace-building. Students will read poetry, fiction, and short stories by Seamus Heaney, Anna Burns, Anne Devlin, and other authors, situating these works within their historical and political contexts from the late 1960s through the Good Friday Agreement and beyond. Attention will be paid to questions of gender, communal silence, memory, and the possibility of reconciliation. Through close reading and critical discussion, students will develop a nuanced understanding of literature's capacity to mediate collective trauma, challenge sectarian binaries, and imagine reconciliation without erasing historical injury. No prior knowledge of Irish history and literature is required.