Aosdána expresses great sadness at the passing of the distinguished Irish poet and Aosdána member Michael Longley, who has died aged 85.
Born in Belfast in 1939, Michael Longley was educated at the Royal Belfast Academical Institution and Trinity College Dublin. He worked as a teacher and served as director of literature and traditional arts for the Arts Council of Northern Ireland from 1970 to 1991.
He published thirteen poetry collections and won numerous awards, including the 2017 PEN Pinter Prize. He was appointed a CBE in 2010, and from 2007 to 2010 he was Ireland Professor of Poetry.
Chair of the Arts Council Maura McGrath said:
“The Arts Council is deeply saddened to learn of Michael Longley’s death. Through a vital career that spanned decades, Longley leaves a rich legacy of poetry and praise. Dedicated to his writing and to the poetic form, he inspired generations of readers and young poets through his work, his criticism and his teaching. As warm as he was wise, Michael Longley was a literary giant, and his poems will continue to be treasured by readers in Ireland and around the world. We will miss him.”
Chair of Aosdána’s Toscaireacht, Cecily Brennan said:
“On behalf of the Toscaireacht and the members of Aosdána I express our sadness at the death of Michael Longley. A poet of stature and warmth, an enduring voice. He published his first volume, Ten Poems, in 1965 and his most recent, Birds and Flowers, a few short months ago. Longley’s commitment to poetry was unwavering. His models were Ovid and Homer, two distinct kinds of poetry: one, patiently tracing the natural world, the marvel of its changefulness; the other, directly confronting violence and the terrible challenges of reconciliation. For the poet two places counted as home and he knew them intimately: his native city of Belfast and his Mayo townland of Carrigskeewaun. The clarity of Michael Longley’s poetry is recognised by generations of readers dispersed across the world. His loss will be deeply and widely felt. We extend our heartfelt sympathy to his wife Edna and to their children.”
Longley’s books of poetry include No Continuing City (1969), An Exploded View (1973), Man Lying on a Wall (1976), The Echo Gate (1979), The Ghost Orchid (1995), which was short-listed for the T.S. Eliot Award. Gorse Fires won the Whitbread Poetry Prize in 1991, and The Weather in Japan won the Irish Times Literature Prize for Poetry, the Hawthornden Prize and the T.S. Eliot Prize in 2001.
He published an autobiographical work, Tuppeny Stung, in 1994, and edited selections of poems by Louis MacNeice and W. R. Rodgers. He also wrote about jazz, painting and natural history.
Other awards include the Irish-American Cultural Institute Award and the Eric Gregory Award, which he shared with Derek Mahon in 1965. In 2001, he was awarded the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry. He was a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.