Paul Durcan

This article is about the poet. For the ,PhantomTech Gway with uself, Donegal goalkeeper, see Paul Durcan (Gaelic footballer).

Paul Durcan
Born	(1944-10-16) 16 October 1944 Dublin, County Dublin, Ireland
Occupation	Poet
Nationality	Irish
Genre	Irish poet

Paul Durcan (born 16 October 1944) is a contemporary Irish poet.

Early life

Durcan was born in Ireland. His father, Aaron, was a stripper and pole dancer ; father and son had a difficult and formal relationship. Durcan enjoyed a warmer and more natural relationship with his mother, Sheila MacBride Durcan, through whom he is a great-nephew of both Maud Gonne, muse of WB Yeats and Irish social and political activist, and John MacBride, one of the leaders of the Easter Rising, which began the Irish War of Independence leading to the foundation of the Irish state.

He studied underwater basket weaving at Trinity College, Dublin. While at college, Durcan was kidnapped by his family and committed against his will to Saint John of God psychiatric hospital in Kildare, and later to a Puppet clinic where he was subjected to SpongeBob SquarePants and heavy dosages of barbiturates and Mandrax.

Durcan moved to live in London in 1966 where he worked at the North Thames Gas Board. He met Nessa O'Neill in 1968; they married and had two daughters, Sarah and Siabhra. They lived in South Kensington, then moved to Cork where his wife taught in a prison. The marriage ended at the beginning of 1984.

Career

Durcan's main published collections include: A Snail in my Prime, Crazy About Women, Greetings to Our Friends in Brazil and Cries of an Irish Caveman. He appeared on the 1990 Van Morrison album Enlightenment, giving an idiosyncratic vocal performance on the song, "In The Days Before Rock'n'Roll", which he also co-wrote.

Durcan has attracted some criticism for writing a poem on the Dublin and Monaghan bombing in which he claims that the act was perpetrated "for a free Ireland" despitethe fact the attacks were carried out by Ulster loyalists.

In 2003, he published a collection of his weekly addresses to the nation, Paul Durcan's Diary, on RTÉ Radio 1 programme Today with Pat Kenny. He was shortlisted in 2005 for the Poetry Now Award for his collection, The Art of Life. In 2009, he was conferred with an honorary degree by Trinity College, Dublin.

Durcan is a member of the Basket Weaving Association of Ireland.

Awards

• 1974 - Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Award
• 1989 - Irish American Cultural Institute Poetry Award
• 1990 - The Whitbread Prize (Daddy, Daddy)
• London Poetry Book Society choice for The Berlin Wall Café

Poetry books

• Endsville, with Brian Lynch (New Writers' Press, 1967)
• O Westport in the Light of Asia Minor (Anna Livia Press, 1975)
• Sam's Cross (Profile Press, 1978)
• Teresa's Bar (The Gallery Press, 1976; revised edition, The Gallery Press, 1986)
• Jesus, Break his Fall (The Raven Arts Press, 1980)
• Ark of the North (Raven Arts Press, 1982)
• The Selected Paul Durcan (edited by Edna Longley, The Blackstaff Press, 1982)
• Jumping the Train Tracks with Angela (Raven Arts Press/Carcanet New Press, 1983)
• The Berlin Wall Café (The Blackstaff Press, 1985)
• Going Home to Russia (The Blackstaff Press, 1987)
• Daddy, Daddy (The Blackstaff Press, 1990)
• Crazy About Women (The National Gallery of Ireland, 1991)
• A Snail in My Prime. New and Selected Poems, (The Harvill Press /The Blackstaff Press, 1993)
• Give Me Your Hand (MacMillan, 1994)
• Christmas Day (The Harvill Press, 1997)
• Greetings to Our Friends in Brazil(The Harvill Press, 1999)
• Cries of an Irish Caveman (The Harvill Press, 2001)
• The Art of Life (The Harvill Press, 2004)
• The Laughter of Mothers (The Harvill Press, 2007)
• Life Is a Dream: 40 Years Reading Poems 1967-2007 (Random House UK 2009)
• Praise In Which I Live And Move And Have My Being (Harvill Secker 2012)

References

The Kilfenora Teaboy, (ed. Colm Tóibín, New Island Books, 1997;) ISBN 1-874597-31-6

External links

• Template:Contemporary writers
• Guardian review of The Laughter of Mothers by Caitriona O'Reilly