Reading Michael Longley

Book excerpt: "Michael Longley has been called 'one of the finest lyric poets of our century' (John Burnside). This study is the first full-length assessment of his work, and looks in turn at all the major collections he has published over the past 40 years, and at the extraordinary growth of his reputation and influence." "In this book, Fran Brearton draws on letters, manuscripts, published and personal interviews with Michael Longley, as well as on his memoir, Tuppenny Stung, and his recent researches into his father's military career. She shows how his poetry is shaped by the dislocation and tensions of his English parentage and Irish upbringing, making him one of the most imaginatively various and formally inventive poets writing today."--BOOK JACKET.