English

The impact of Seamus Heaney on the cultural landscape has been profound and far-reaching.  His vision has shaped the ways many of us understand the local, the national, and the international – and our place within all three.  His sure-footed voice has been an important record of our time and place, a tuning-fork sending back signals from the place where language meets pure ideas.  Hearing Heaney is a collection of responses to Heaney’s vision and clarity of thought, expression, and ideals.  Asked to provide readings of Heaney’s work, which involved for many a personal reflection on its impact on their work or life, this collection includes contributions from a diverse range of backgrounds: journalists, fellow poets and academics.  These diverse essays provide the reader with a fascinating series of lenses through which to view the achievement of Heaney’s work and its lasting impact on the world of language and art.  Each of these reflective essays reveals something of the power of Heaney’s writing to influence, enlighten, inform, and inspire.  What they reveal, in other words, are the myriad ways in which ‘Hearing Heaney’ has helped us to understand who we are, where we are from, and where we may be going.