A. L. Mentxaka

Aintzane Legarreta Mentxaka is a writer and academic, based in Dublin, Ireland.^[1]

Mentxaka is a scholar of literature, particularly modernism, noted for her interdisciplinary work. She is also a playwright.^[2]

Mentxaka's most recent book of criticism is 'The Postcolonial Traveller' (2016).^[3] She is the author of Kate O'Brien and the Fiction of Identity (2011),^[4] an academic book which was described by the European Journal of English Studies in a positive review as "a challenging detective story, scholarly, yet unpredictable."^[5] Unusually, the book was launched simultaneously in Dublin (Ireland),^[6] and in Bilbao (Basque Country, Spain),^[7] on account of the Irish O'Brien's strong links to the Basque Country and Spain.

Mentxaka has published numerous essays in peer-reviewed and other publications. The Irish Examiner, in a positive review of her essay 'Film into Novel', emphasized that "[Mentxaka's] prose is clear, well-written and informative, and opens new and fascinating doors to the interpretation of O’Brien’s novels".^[8] Her work on O'Brien has also been hailed as groundbreaking by the Basque press, for revealing the Irish writer's allegorical richness in her description of the Basque Country,^[9] and for evidencing the impact of O'Brien's Basque experiences in her work.^[10] In an interview with Joseba Tobar-Arbulu, Mentxaka referred to her promotion of O'Brien's novels in the Basque Country as "a civic duty".^[11]

Her plays range from drama and history, to comedy and experimental work. They include 'A Pair of New Eyes' (2013),^[12] 'For Valentine' (2009, 2014),^[13] 'Visitor' (2015),^[14] 'One Nite Stand: A Shakespearean Tragicomedy' (2014, co-written with Auxi Martinez),^[15] 'Alien in Bewleys' (1999), and 'Grainne' (2015, co-written with J. Costello, K. Doyle, and L. Errity).^[16] The play 'A Pair of New Eyes' was included in 'Ten Things To Do' in Gay Community News magazine, which summarized it as "Romance, friendship, betrayal, seduction, and two respectable ladies",^[17][18]

Mentxaka lectures at the American College Dublin. and works as mediator/facilitator at the Irish Museum of Modern Art.^[19] She has also worked at Dublin City University, and at University College Dublin,^[20] where she completed a post-doctoral research fellowship on Modernism.^[21]

References