The colonial experience in the works of Charles Robert Maturin

The works of Charles Robert Maturin (1780-1924) present an instructive example of the influence that Ireland's colonial status exerted on the literary output of nineteenth-century Irish writers. The 'colonial experience' made itself felt in three radically different ways. Maturin's private life was conditioned by his status as a curate in the official Church of Ireland, a colonial institution. In his writings he frequently turned to the effects of colonialism on the cultural, political and economic scene in his country, discussing and criticising these effects even in those of his works which are not set in Ireland, while The Milesian Chief, an imaginative evocation of an Irish insurrection, ought to be central to any discussion of British political and military colonialism in the nineteenth century. In his literary reputation, Maturin suffered from what might be termed 'literary colonialism', the dominance of the expectations of the British reading public. The case of Maturin can be seen, beyond the limits of Irish literature, as illuminating the situation of any writer working under colonialist conditions.