Seamus Heaney
author profile
born
April 13, 1939
gender
male
place of birth
Castledawson, Northern Ireland, The United Kingdom
genre
Poetry
influences
Geoffrey Chaucer, Lord Byron, T. S. Eliot, Robert Frost, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Ted Hughes, Patrick Kavanagh, John Keats, Derek Mahon, Wilfred Owen, Samuel Palmer, William Shakespeare, J.M. Synge, William Wordsworth, William Butler Yeats
about this author
Seamus Justin Heaney is an Irish poet, writer and lecturer from County Londonderry, Northern Ireland. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1995, "for works of lyrical beauty and ethical depth, which exalt everyday miracles and the living past." He currently lives in Dublin.
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avg rating: 3.54
| 15,187 ratings
| 1,127 reviews
| 76 distinct works
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16 fans
More books by Seamus Heaney…
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Opened Ground: Selected Poems, 1966-1996 by Seamus Heaney avg rating 4.36 — 513 ratings — published 1998 5 editions |
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Selected Poems 1966-1987 by Seamus Heaney avg rating 4.26 — 174 ratings — published 1990 2 editions |
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Death Of A Naturalist by Seamus Heaney avg rating 4.38 — 148 ratings — published 1966 4 editions |
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North: Poems by Seamus Heaney avg rating 4.06 — 148 ratings — published 1975 11 editions |
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District and Circle: Poems by Seamus Heaney avg rating 4.01 — 129 ratings — published 2006 4 editions |
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The Spirit Level by Seamus Heaney avg rating 4.16 — 122 ratings — published 1996 8 editions |
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Seeing Things: Poems by Seamus Heaney avg rating 4.11 — 114 ratings — published 1991 6 editions |
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Field Work by Seamus Heaney avg rating 4.30 — 101 ratings — published 1979 5 editions |
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The Burial at Thebes: A Version of Sophocles' Antigone by Seamus Heaney , Sophocles avg rating 3.73 — 86 ratings — published 2004 7 editions |
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Station Island by Seamus Heaney avg rating 4.18 — 71 ratings — published 1984 5 editions |
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upcoming events
No scheduled events.
"It is always better
to avenge dear ones than to indulge in mourning.
For every one of us, living in this world
means waiting for our end. Let whoever can
win glory before death. When a warrior is gone,
that will be his best and only bulwark."
— Seamus Heaney (Beowulf: A New Verse Translation)
to avenge dear ones than to indulge in mourning.
For every one of us, living in this world
means waiting for our end. Let whoever can
win glory before death. When a warrior is gone,
that will be his best and only bulwark."
— Seamus Heaney (Beowulf: A New Verse Translation)
"Now it’s high watermark
and floodtide in the heart
and time to go.
The sea-nymphs in the spray
will be the chorus now.
What’s left to say?
Suspect too much sweet-talk
but never close your mind.
It was a fortunate wind
that blew me here. I leave
half-ready to believe
that a crippled trust might walk
and the half-true rhyme is love."
— Seamus Heaney (The Cure at Troy: A Version of Sophocles' Philoctetes)
and floodtide in the heart
and time to go.
The sea-nymphs in the spray
will be the chorus now.
What’s left to say?
Suspect too much sweet-talk
but never close your mind.
It was a fortunate wind
that blew me here. I leave
half-ready to believe
that a crippled trust might walk
and the half-true rhyme is love."
— Seamus Heaney (The Cure at Troy: A Version of Sophocles' Philoctetes)
