Contemporary Irish Poetry

by Paul Muldoon (Editor)

Allows the readers to explore substantial selections of the poetry of ten postwar poets - Patrick Kavanagh, Louis MacNeice, Thomas Kinsella, John Montague, Michael Longley, Seamus Heaney, Derek Mahon, Paul Durcan, Tom Paulin and Medbh McGuckian.

Genres: Poetry

416 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2006

About the author

Born in Northern Ireland, Muldoon currently resides in the US and teaches at Princeton University. He held the chair of Professor of Poetry at Oxford University from 1999 through 2004. In September 2007, Muldoon became the poetry editor of The New Yorker.

Awards:
1992: Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize for Madoc: A Mystery
1994: T. S. Eliot Prize for The Annals of Chile
1997: Irish Times Irish Literature Prize for Poetry for New Selected Poems 1968–1994
2002: T. S. Eliot Prize (shortlist) for Moy Sand and Gravel
2003: Griffin Poetry Prize (Canada) for Moy Sand and Gravel
2003: Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for Moy Sand and Gravel
2004: American Ireland Fund Literary Award
2004: Aspen Prize
2004: Shakespeare Prize

Reviews

[William · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5*

[Simon Lewis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lots of good poems in here. Would have liked some notes or reasons why the particular poems were chosen.

[Samanta · Rating 3 out of 5]

Realmente había pocos autores que me hayan llegado. La mayoría de los poemas eran sobre la guerra y sus consecuencias.

Yo lo siento pero con la poesía soy muy tiquismiquis, necesito ver imágenes potentes y que me traspase el alma con un cuchillo. Esto no me ha pasado con esta antología.

Me ha llevado prácticamente un año leerla porque se me hacía pesada y me daba pereza.

Me ha decepcionado bastante, la verdad. Pero bueno.

[Brian · Rating 3 out of 5]

These poems were hardly contemporary when this volume was published, even less so today. A number of the poets were already dead then. There’s also only one woman included, Mebh McGuckian, while a handful of the men seem redundant, as they write almost exactly the same kinds of poems in the same way. There are some upsides, though. There are a couple poets included that I might not have sought out before but now am looking forward reading further. It’s a decent reference or starting point, but on the whole it isn’t a particularly good example of “contemporary Irish poetry.”

[Lisa Stice · Rating 3 out of 5]

I absolutely love the Seamus Heaney and Medbh McGuckian sections.

[James Barrett · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very nice selection from Patrick Kavanagh, Louis MacNeice, Thomas Kinsella, John Montague, Michael Longley, Seamus Heaney, Derek Mahon, Paul Durcan, Tom Paulin and Medbh McGuckian.

[Hannah Goff · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am not a big fan of poetry, but this collection really gives you a good idea of the historical psyche or Ireland, especially considering the importance of poets in Irish history.