American novelist Bonnie Greer has spoken of her amazement at the positive response to her defence of Ireland in a BBC Question Time debate on Brexit.

Greer, who has lived in the UK since 1986, told audience members on the TV show on Thursday that Ireland owes the UK nothing, while speaking about Boris Johnson’s Brexit proposal.

The writer said she had since received a wave of support from the country.

“I think I’ve been invited to every town and city in Ireland and I’m very grateful, it’s amazing. I don’t know what to say. I thought I said something that everybody knew,” she told RTE Radio 1.

“I think a lot of British people, the people who responded to me, were fairly astonished.”

Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Show all 12 1 /12 Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Derry, Londonderry A garage door displaying unionism, bolted shut, like a visual representation of Brexit Britain, locked to outsiders, safeguarding what’s inside Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Derry, Londonderry Rossville Street, the site of Bloody Sunday, where messages demand a severance with England. From this perspective, Britain is England in sheep’s clothing, the real empire, the centre of colonial power Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Bangor A political message in paint not yet dry, still forming, setting, adjusting, or in old paint finally eroding, melting away Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Bangor Moral judgement frames a residential view. The message seeks to make everybody involved in the religious narrative: those who don’t believe are those most in debt Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Castlerock The beach is sparse and almost empty, but covered in footprints. The shower is designed to wash off sand, and a mysterious border cuts a divide through the same sand Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Belfast Two attempts to affect and care for the body. One stimulated by vanity and social norms and narratives of beauty, the other by a need to keep warm in the winter night Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Belfast The gate to an unclaimed piece of land, where nothing is being built, where no project is in the making, where a sign demands the creation of something new Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Derry, Londonderry Under a motorway bridge a woman’s face stares, auburn and red-lipped, her skin tattooed with support for the IRA and a message of hostility to advocates of the Social Investment Fund Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Derry, Londonderry The Fountain Murals, where the curbs and the lampposts are painted the red, white, and blue of the Union Flag. A boy walks past in the same colours, fitting the scene, camouflaged Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Coleraine A public slandering by the football fields, for all to see or ignore. I wonder if it’s for the police or for the community Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Belfast A tattoo parlour, where the artist has downed tools, momentarily, bringing poise to the scene, which looks like a place of mourning, not a site of creation Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: Northern Ireland Derry, Londonderry A barrier of grey protects the contents of this shop, guarding it from the streets outside, but it cannot conceal it completely, and the colours of lust and desire and temptation cut through Richard Morgan/The Independent

Ms Greer explained to audience members on Thursday that the US was unlikely to support a trade deal with the UK if it passed a Brexit deal that violates the Good Friday Agreement or disadvantaged Ireland.

“The Good Friday Agreement, in spite of its rather benign name … is a truce,” she said.

“And it’s a truce because the United States of America and the EU sat down with this country to make it happen. We have to be much more serious about this.”

Ms Greer added: “The United States is Irish. If anyone thinks that they’re going to get a deal through and have a trade relationship with the United States that shafts Ireland, you’ve got another thing coming.”

Her defence of Ireland’s interests received enthusiastic support on social media.

Declan Lawn, a writer and filmmaker, wrote: “Can we get Bonnie Greer an Irish passport so she can be president after Michael D [Higgins]?”

“Oh my god Bonnie Greer, if Ireland ever has a Queen, [I] nominate you,” Nicola Coughlan, an actor known for her role in Derry Girls, added.

Mr Johnson’s proposal would create two new borders for Northern Ireland, with custom checks on trade with the Republic and a regulatory control border down the Irish Sea between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK.

However, that proposal has been rejected by the European parliament, which said it was not “even remotely” acceptable.