Critical Essay | Critical Essay by William Grimes

Critical Essay by William Grimes

SOURCE: "Irish Poet Wins the Nobel Prize in Literature," in The New York Times, October 6, 1995, pp. B1, B18.

[In the following article, Grimes summarizes Heaney's life and career.]

The Irish poet Seamus Heaney has been awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. In conferring the prize, the Swedish Academy praised Mr. Heaney "for works of lyrical beauty and ethical depth, which exalt everyday miracles and the living past."

It also praised Mr. Heaney, a Roman Catholic, for analyzing the violence in Northern Ireland without recourse to conventional terms.

The poet (whose name is pronounced SHA Y-muss HEE-nee) will receive the award on Dec. 10 at a ceremony in Stockholm, along with the Nobel winners in physics, chemistry, economics and medicine, who will be announced next week. This year the prize is worth more than $1 million, the highest it has ever been.

The poet Derek Walcott, who won the...
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