After his first collection of poems, Death Of A Naturalist, was published by Faber & Faber in 1966, Heaney was heralded as a major new talent and this culminated in 1995 when he won the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Born into a farming family in Derry, Heaney lived in a community which actively campaigned for civil rights. A large part of his work coincided with, and frequently reflected, the turmoil that was unfolding during The Troubles. For example, his poems about the preserved Iron Age bodies found in bogs in Denmark and Ireland say as much about the situation in Northern Ireland as it did about the world in which they were executed or sacrificed.
Elsewhere, Mid-Term Break is a poem that nearly every Irish person has learned as part of their Leaving Cert. Heaney never allowed himself to become a spokesman for the Republican cause, despite pressure to do so as the situation in Northern Ireland became increasingly violent and oppressive.Admired and loved far beyond the UK and Ireland, Heaney's work inspired a whole generation of people and artists alike. He was also a professor at Harvard in the 1980s and 90s.
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Source: IrishMirror - 🏆 4. / 98 Read more »