An Crann Faoi Bhláth: the Flowering Tree: Contemporary Irish Poetry With Verse Translations

by Declan Kiberd (Editor), George Fitzmaurice (Editor), Pearse Hutchinson

This volume of contemporary Irish poetry, with English verse translations, will give readers an invaluable overview of the variety, quality and concerns of modern Irish language poetry. Including all the major poets and representing each generation to present day writers, the collection reveals a living poetic imagination, linking successfully the traditional fine craftsmanship of the gaelic poet with the new imagery and open rhythms of contemporary European and English writing.

For readers fluent in Irish language, the collection offers selection from the best modern writers; for others, the verse translations provide access to the thoughts, ideas, experiences and modes of expression of a separate and independent literary tradition.

Táimíd sásta gur sár-leabhar filíochta atá anseo do gach éinne, Crann Faoi Bhláth gan amhras. The 1981 historical anthology An Duanaire, was sub-titled ‘Poems of the Dispossessed’ – the present volume, reflecting the great impact of social, cultural and political change in twentieth-century Ireland, is titled to reflect the poetic blossoming that is represented in The Flowering Tree: An Crann Faoi Bhláth.

Genres: Poetry, Irish Literature

352 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1991

About the author

Declan Kiberd is a professor of Anglo-Irish literature at the University College Dublin and the author of Inventing Ireland: The Literature of the Modern Nation, which won the Irish Times Prize, and of Ulysses and Us: The Art of Everyday Life in Joyce's Masterpiece. He lives in Dublin.

Reviews

[Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

The best introduction to the subject so far. The Introduction alone is worth the purchase price, but the verse translations work very well. We could do with a similar book on the poets of the Oriol tradition...