Des Kavanagh’s poems are full of the names of people and places he knows or has known well. Names are great familiarisers and Kavanagh’s Ireland is a close and familiar place. But it also bears within it the ache of absence, not just for specific people, but for the world they inhabited, a world that made them and that they also made. Kavanagh’s ancestral Inishowen in Donegal, his family, in it’s old and new generations, often provide the pivot that turns him to the past, although it also allows for glimpses of the future, through children and grandchildren — so said the late Seamus Deane of the Galway poet.
I was slightly nervous ahead of this week’s interview. Tessio had got in touch and arranged a meeting. Thankfully, it went smoothly (although I made sure .
St. Columb’s College in Derry will host former Irish Ambassador to Russia and past pupil, Jim Sharkey, to deliver a talk on his time in the country and he.
An alleged sex abuser at a prestigious Catholic grammar school taught his pupils a Nazi marching anthem, the author of which later joined the party, a former pupil has said.