Seamus Heaney - Hardcover

Vendler, Helen

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0002558564 ISBN 13: 9780002558563

Publisher: HarperCollins, 1998

Synopsis

A dazzling short assessment of the life and work of the poet and winner of the 1995 Nobel Prize for literature, by one of the finest literary critics now writing.

In awarding the Nobel Prize for Literature to Seamus Heaney in 1995, the committee recognized a lifetime of beautiful and profound writing, beloved by readers around the world.

Among Heaney’s many published collections are Death of a Naturalist, North, Field Work, Rattle Bag, Station Island and, most recently, the bestselling Spirit Level (May 1996).

Yet despite his popularity, Heaney’s poetry can be difficult and intractable, not least because it is linked to two rich literary traditions, the English and the Irish.

The time is ripe for a clear, explicatory work that relates the poet to his work. Helen Vendler’s beautifully written book will do precisely this.

About this title

Review:

İA¨ luminous new study...One of America's foremost poetry critics, İVendler¨ disagrees with critics who stress İHeaney's¨ poetry's political content, focusing instead on the poetry as 'aesthetic and intellectual experiments.' -- Jonathan Allison "The Monitor"

İHelen Vendler's¨ reading of Heaney is a marvelously illuminating achievement...Most magically of all, İthis book¨ manages, while rejecting engagement on the 'thematic' level, to be constantly stimulating towards other readings while it entertains. -- Bernard O'Donoghue "Essays in Criticism"

Perhaps no late 20th-century poet feels the poignantly complex responsibilities of literary vocation as deeply as Seaumus Heaney, and with this book Vendler proves that no reader of his work is better attuned to those concerns. Following last year's widely admired "The Art of Shakespeare's Sonnets," her intelligent, lively and reflective exploration of the first three decades of the Nobel laureate's career succeeds in many tasks: it is both an admiring, readable introduction and an anthology of best poems, and it builds an important case for attending to stylistic innovations while still addressing Heaney's relation to Northern Ireland's troubles.

Quiet virtuosity sustains this work from one of our leading literary critics...While steadfastly attentive to the words before her, Vendler shows herself to be agreeably imaginative; also, remarkably, she's a critic whose powers sometimes seem akin to those of her subjects. But she serves, too, as a loyal and true intermediary between poetry and its potential readers, offering a concise, plainspoken companion volume to Heaney's "oeuvre" without making the work seem more--or less--difficult than it really is. Her unusual fairness in an age when criticism is often either politically motivated or too arcane in its language and concepts to be read widely should be noted (and noted again). Would that there were more Vendlers writing criticism--and not about poetry alone.

The task İHelen Vendler¨ sets herself in this book is to demonstrate exactly how, by various means and in answer to a range of provocations, artistic, historic, and personal, the remarkable growth and development of Heaney's poetry over the last thirty years has been achieved...It is difficult to imagine a critic more in tune with her subject. Alert to the part played by etymological knowledge and wit in Heaney's work, she is also, thanks to her Irish Catholic upbringing, able to clarify for the uninstructed the meaning of his liturgical references. The political dimensions of Heaney's work, the 'dolorous circumstances' of Ireland, are referred to where necessary with restraint, compassion, and brevity...İHelen Vendler is¨ our period's most distinguished literary critic. -- Ann Cobb "Harvard Review"

towards other readings while it entertains.

familial. Her book is a triumph for the poet and the reader.

to understand his masterly use of sound, symbol, imagery and parable.

restraint, compassion, and brevity...[Helen Vendler is] our period's most distinguished literary critic.

'to grasp and perpetuate, by symbolic form, the self's volatile and transient here and now'...[An] illuminating orientation.

From the Back Cover:

A dazzling assessment of the life and work of the poet and winner of the 1995 Nobel Prize for literature, by one of the finest literary critics now writing. Helen Vendler links the poet to his work and his poetry to two rich literary traditions, the English and the Irish. Seamus Heaney has grappled to find symbols adequate to the predicament of his Ulster background and create an ethical poetry that recognizes authentic human intensity wherever it occurs. Collections such as ' Death of a Salesman, Station Island' and most recently, the best-selling 'Spirit Level' document his lyrical mastery and moral rigour. This powerfully written critical biography is the first to illuminate both the art and the life of Heaney, the world’s most celebrated poet.

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0002558564
• ISBN 13: 9780002558563
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 224