Sounding Heaney

Seamus Heaney was the most celebrated English language poet of his generation. His public persona transcended the genre: following the award of his Nobel Prize in 1995 he was afforded the status of establishment sage, to be fêted by authorities and quoted by presidents. His enduring achievement has since been enshrined both in school curricula and in corporate ventures such as the Seamus Heaney Centre for Poetry in Belfast and the Heaney HomePlace in Bellaghy, institutionalisation that does much to ensure that his writing will retain cultural currency for years to come. The Estate of Seamus Heaney website does well to remind us, however, that ‘most of all’ this man’s legacy ‘lives on through the poems themselves’. Accolades and encomia bring with them a risk that these, the surest foundation of a poet’s fame, will be reduced to incidental evidence of their author’s status and exemplary character. At that point the scene is set for an iconoclastic reaction and subsequent neglect. Heaney’s posthumous reputation will therefore need to be securely grounded in a clear-eyed appreciation of the distinctive nature, quality and continuing relevance of his writing. It is with this in mind that the essays in Sounding Heaney place the poetry centre-stage once more, invoking its compelling spirit as they reassess its value within the context of a changing world.