Description
Micheal O'Siadhail knows desire, love, trust and wonder, while at the same time facing suffering, tragedy and loss. His life has always been a yearning for meaning, and these four decades of poems work both head and heart towards a ripe wisdom. They are not only richly personal - marriage, friendship, vocation, grief - but also engage with what matters in culture and society - music, language, city life and the dynamics of history. His deep roots are Irish but O'Siadhail's scope is global. This is life lived to the full with jazz-like leaps and let-go where classical forms and variations make for playful freedom and innovation. His Collected Poems draws on thirteen collections, and includes a CD of him reading a selection of poems.
About the Author
Micheal O'Siadhail [pronounced Mee-hall Oh Sheel] is a prolific Irish poet whose work sets the intensities of a life against the background of worlds shaken by change. His Collected Poems (2013) draws on thirteen previous collections, nine of these published by Bloodaxe, including Hail! Madam Jazz: New and Selected Poems (1992), Our Double Time (1998), Poems 1975-1995 (1999), The Gossamer Wall: poems in witness to the Holocaust (2002), Love Life (2005), Globe (2007) and Tongues (2010). It was followed by One Crimson Thread (Bloodaxe Books, 2015), his book of essays, Say But the Word: Poetry as Vision and Voice, ed. David F Ford & Margie M. Tolstoy (Carysfort Press, 2015), and The Five Quintets (Baylor University Press, US, 2018). He constantly seeks new dimensions through his poetry: examining the passions of friendship, marriage, trust and betrayal in an urban culture, tracing the intricacies of music and science as he tries to shape an understanding of the shifts and transformations of late modernity. In Musics of Belonging: The Poetry of Micheal O'Siadhail (Carysfort Press, 2007), the book's co-editor David F. Ford lists O'Siadhail's characteristic themes as 'despair, women, love, friendship, language, school, vocation, music, city life, science and other cultures and histories. There is a wrestle for meaning, with no easy resolution - both the form and the content are hard-won.' Jazz is a leitmotiv throughout his work. Born in 1947, he was educated at Clongowes Wood College, Trinity College Dublin and the University of Oslo. He has been a lecturer at Trinity College Dublin and a professor at the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies. Among his many academic works are Learning Irish (Yale University Press, 1988) and Modern Irish (Cambridge University Press, 1989). In 1987 he resigned his professorship order to write poetry full-time, supported by giving numerous readings in many parts of the world. He won the Marten Toonder Prize for Literature in 1998. He now divides his time between Dublin and New York.
Reviews
'If Micheal O'Siadhail weren't already a large figure in Irish literature, this enormous volume would raise a monument to him' - Brian Lynch, Irish Independent 'O'Siadhail's books in turn report and discuss his experiences, of school, a long marriage and, latterly, his responses to the Holocaust, globalisation and other languages. Those last two subjects are the starting points for his most recent collections, Globe (2007) and Tongues (2010), which are admirably interested in trying out new kinds of line and form as they jam together his disorienting sense of a changing world with his memories of what has disappeared' - John McAuliffe, Irish Times on Collected Poems 'This is a vital book for anyone tracking the contemporary poetic landscape; it is the testament of a poet working not in a school or tradition, but rather as a "tradition-bearer, a memory-passer and a welcome"... years of reading, analysis , and generous artistry provide rich gifts for every reader.' - Martyn Halsall, Church Times
Book Information
ISBN 9781852249823
Author Micheal O'Siadhail
Format Paperback
Page Count 820
Imprint Bloodaxe Books Ltd
Publisher Bloodaxe Books Ltd
About the Author
Micheal O'Siadhail [pronounced Mee-hall Oh Sheel] is a prolific Irish poet whose work sets the intensities of a life against the background of worlds shaken by change. His Collected Poems (2013) draws on thirteen previous collections, nine of these published by Bloodaxe, including Hail! Madam Jazz: New and Selected Poems (1992), Our Double Time (1998), Poems 1975-1995 (1999), The Gossamer Wall: poems in witness to the Holocaust (2002), Love Life (2005), Globe (2007) and Tongues (2010). It was followed by One Crimson Thread (Bloodaxe Books, 2015), his book of essays, Say But the Word: Poetry as Vision and Voice, ed. David F Ford & Margie M. Tolstoy (Carysfort Press, 2015), and The Five Quintets (Baylor University Press, US, 2018). He constantly seeks new dimensions through his poetry: examining the passions of friendship, marriage, trust and betrayal in an urban culture, tracing the intricacies of music and science as he tries to shape an understanding of the shifts and transformations of late modernity. In Musics of Belonging: The Poetry of Micheal O'Siadhail (Carysfort Press, 2007), the book's co-editor David F. Ford lists O'Siadhail's characteristic themes as 'despair, women, love, friendship, language, school, vocation, music, city life, science and other cultures and histories. There is a wrestle for meaning, with no easy resolution - both the form and the content are hard-won.' Jazz is a leitmotiv throughout his work. Born in 1947, he was educated at Clongowes Wood College, Trinity College Dublin and the University of Oslo. He has been a lecturer at Trinity College Dublin and a professor at the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies. Among his many academic works are Learning Irish (Yale University Press, 1988) and Modern Irish (Cambridge University Press, 1989). In 1987 he resigned his professorship order to write poetry full-time, supported by giving numerous readings in many parts of the world. He won the Marten Toonder Prize for Literature in 1998. He now divides his time between Dublin and New York.
Reviews
'If Micheal O'Siadhail weren't already a large figure in Irish literature, this enormous volume would raise a monument to him' - Brian Lynch, Irish Independent 'O'Siadhail's books in turn report and discuss his experiences, of school, a long marriage and, latterly, his responses to the Holocaust, globalisation and other languages. Those last two subjects are the starting points for his most recent collections, Globe (2007) and Tongues (2010), which are admirably interested in trying out new kinds of line and form as they jam together his disorienting sense of a changing world with his memories of what has disappeared' - John McAuliffe, Irish Times on Collected Poems 'This is a vital book for anyone tracking the contemporary poetic landscape; it is the testament of a poet working not in a school or tradition, but rather as a "tradition-bearer, a memory-passer and a welcome"... years of reading, analysis , and generous artistry provide rich gifts for every reader.' - Martyn Halsall, Church Times
Book Information
ISBN 9781852249823
Author Micheal O'Siadhail
Format Paperback
Page Count 820
Imprint Bloodaxe Books Ltd
Publisher Bloodaxe Books Ltd
