Once regarded as Ireland’s national bard, Thomas Moore's reputation rests on the ten immensely popular collections of drawing-room songs known as the Irish Melodies. At home and abroad, these 124 songs created a realm of influence that continued to define Irish culture throughout the nineteenth century and into the twentieth. In this book, Una Hunt provides the first detailed assessment from a combined musical and literary standpoint, contextualizing the songs through an examination of their ‘sources’ and ‘style’. Further attention is given to the collaborative work of composers Sir John Stevenson and Henry Rowley Bishop and the study is completed by a reappraisal of the musical sources.

This collection of eleven essays positions Moore within a developing and expanding international readership during the course of the nineteenth century. In accounting for the successes he achieved and the challenges he faced, recurring themes include: Moore’s influence and reputation; modes of dissemination through networks and among communities; also, the articulation of personal, political, and national identities. This book, the product of an international team of scholars, is the first to focus explicitly on the reputations of Thomas Moore in different parts of the world, including Bombay, Dublin, Leipzig, and London, as well as America, Canada, Greece, and the Hispanic world. Through it, we will understand more about Moore’s reception, and also appreciate how the publication and dissemination of poetry and song in the romantic and Victorian eras operated in different parts of the world—in particular considering how artistic and political networks effected the transmission of cultural products.

Written by internationally established scholars of Thomas Moore’s music, poetry, and prose writing, Thomas Moore and Romantic Inspiration is a collection of twelve essays and a timely response to significant new biographical, historiographical and editorial work on Moore. This collection reflects the rich variety of cutting-edge work being done on this significant and prolific figure. Sarah McCleave and Brian Caraher have contributed an introduction that positions Moore in his own time (1800-1850), addresses subsequent neglect in the twentieth century, and contextualises the contemporary re-evaluation of Thomas Moore as a figure of considerable interdisciplinary artistic and cultural significance. The contributions to this collection establish Moore’s importance in the fields of Neoclassical and Romantic lyricism, musical performance, song-writing, postcolonial criticism, Orientalism and biographical writing— as well as defining the significance of his voice as an engaged social and political commentator of a strongly cosmopolitan and pluralistic inclination.

Lyrics to more than 200 melodic gems, including "The Harp That Once through Tara's Halls," "Believe Me, If All Those Endearing Young Charms" and many more, accompanied by charming illustrations.

This is the first book to detail the musical and cultural significance of the songster.