It might not be the first country you associate with the genre, but from Jonathan Swift to Flann O’Brien and beyond, the future’s always been there
To the uninitiated, the idea of Irish science fiction seems slightly odd; the country’s culture is generally assumed to be more invested in the past than the future, and to value the fantastic over the supposedly rational.
But it may not be quite as absurd a notion as it once was: Ireland is now as cosmopolitan as any other country in Europe; multinationals have established tech enclaves in incongruous rural areas, and Dublin’s economy is largely dependent on IT. I’ve recently put together an anthology for Tramp Press, A Brilliant Void, that proves the existence of Irish sci-fi centuries back. It has, I found, its own distinctive tenor – a kind of cautious optimism for the future, leavened with the cynical expectation that avaricious, unaccountable chancers will bring about disaster nonetheless.
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