{"id":235,"date":"2006-04-24T19:11:46","date_gmt":"2006-04-24T18:11:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/index.php\/2006\/04\/24\/poetry-monday\/"},"modified":"2006-04-24T19:19:21","modified_gmt":"2006-04-24T18:19:21","slug":"poetry-monday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/2006\/04\/24\/poetry-monday\/","title":{"rendered":"Poetry Monday"},"content":{"rendered":"

With his Nobel Prize, his involvement in the Celtic Revival, and his later political prominence, Yeats is undoubtedly Ireland’s great national poet. And yet, those of us living in the real, as opposed to the imagined Ireland will see more that we recognise in the work of Patrick Kavanagh. Kavanagh himself suspected as much, and it undoubtedly rankled with him. The title was “Ireland’s greatest poet since Yeats” contained the implicit judgement: not as good as Yeats. Without wishing to get involved in that<\/em> little argument, I will say that Kavanagh’s work is probably better loved in Ireland than that of his predecessor. The reasons for this are many, but key among them are his career-long allegience to the reality of the Ireland in which he lived and which largley (though decreasingly) survives today. His poem Epic<\/a> can be seen as a declaration of poetic independance:<\/p>\n

I have lived in important places, times
\nWhen great events were decided, who owned
\nThat half a rood of rock, a no-man’s land
\nSurrounded by our pitchfork-armed claims.
\nI heard the Duffys shouting “Damn your soul”
\nAnd old McCabe stripped to the waist, seen
\nStep the plot defying blue cast-steel\u2014
\n“Here is the march along these iron stones”
\nThat was the year of the Munich bother. Which
\nWas more important? I inclined
\nTo lose my faith in Ballyrush and Gortin
\nTil Homer’s ghost came whispering to my mind
\nHe said: I made the Iliad from such
\nA local row. Gods make their own importance.<\/em><\/p>\n

Here he is declaring his independance from Yeats’ Cetic Twilight, choosing the stony, mucky, fierce Ireland he knew from his own life. Also, as the foremost poet of a still-young republic he is issuing a rallying-cry to all those that might follow him. His dismissal of the origins of World War Two as “the Munich bother” is not merely a joke. The poet finds the eternal in the particular, and from a poet’s perspective, a row over “half a rood of rock” is more significant than a political event happening far away. In aid of his case, he cites Homer: “I made the Iliad from such a local row”. The work of later Irish poets as different as Seamus Heany and Paul Durcan, celebrating and encapsulating the details of Irish life, both urban and rural suggests that they have taken up his challenge to poetic independence. Durcan’s<\/a> own tribute “Surely My God is Kavanagh” suggests that if “Gods make their own importance”, so too do poets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With his Nobel Prize, his involvement in the Celtic Revival, and his later political prominence, Yeats is undoubtedly Ireland’s great national poet. And yet, those of us living in the real, as opposed to the imagined Ireland will see more that we recognise in the work of Patrick Kavanagh. Kavanagh himself suspected as much, and it undoubtedly rankled with him. The title was “Ireland’s greatest poet since Yeats” contained the implicit judgement: not as good as Yeats. Without wishing to get involved in that little argument, I will say that Kavanagh’s work is probably better loved in Ireland than that of his predecessor. The reasons for this are many, but key among them are his career-long allegience to the reality of the Ireland in which he lived and which largley (though decreasingly) survives today. His poem Epic can be seen as a declaration of poetic independance: I have lived in important places, times When great events were decided, who owned That half a rood of rock, a no-man’s land Surrounded by our pitchfork-armed claims. I heard the Duffys shouting “Damn your soul” And old McCabe stripped to the waist, seen Step the plot defying blue cast-steel\u2014 “Here is the march along these iron stones” That was the year of the Munich bother. Which Was more important? I inclined To lose my faith in Ballyrush and Gortin Til Homer’s ghost came whispering to my mind He said: I made the Iliad from such A local row. Gods make their own importance. Here he is declaring his independance from Yeats’ Cetic Twilight, choosing the stony, mucky, fierce Ireland he knew from his own life. Also, as the foremost poet of a still-young republic he is issuing a rallying-cry to all those that might follow him. His dismissal of the origins of World War Two as “the Munich bother” is not merely a joke. The poet finds the eternal in the particular, and from a poet’s perspective, a row over “half a rood of rock” is more significant than a political event happening far away. In aid of his case, he cites Homer: “I made the Iliad from such a local row”. The work of later Irish poets as different as Seamus Heany and Paul Durcan, celebrating and encapsulating the details of Irish life, both urban and rural suggests that they have taken up his challenge to poetic independence. Durcan’s own tribute “Surely […]","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[89],"class_list":["post-235","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","tag-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}