Paul Durcan

{{About|the poet|the Donegal goalkeeper|Paul Durcan (Gaelic footballer)}}

{{Infobox person

| name = Paul Durcan

| native_name = {{Native name|ga|Pól Mac Duarcáin|paren=omit}}

| image = Paul Durcan.jpg

| caption = Durcan in 2008

| birth_date = {{birth date|1944|10|16|df=y}}

| birth_place = Dublin, Ireland

| death_date = {{Death date and age|2025|05|17|1944|10|16|df=y}}

| death_place =

| occupation = Poet

| years_active = 1967–2016

| spouse = {{marriage|Nessa O'Neill|1968|1984|end=div}}

| children = 2

| website =

}}

Paul Durcan (16 October 1944 – 17 May 2025) was an Irish poet.

Early life and education

Durcan was born in Dublin on 16 October 1944.{{Cite web |last=Martiny |first=Erik |author-link=Erik Martiny |date=12 October 2024 |title=Paul Durcan {{!}} Biography, Books, Poems, & Facts |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Paul-Durcan |access-date=18 May 2025 |website=Encyclopædia Britannica}} He grew up in Dublin and spent his summers in Turlough, County Mayo. His father, John, was a barrister and circuit court judge and his mother Sheila MacBride from Westport was a qualified solicitor.

In the early 1960s, he studied Economics at University College Dublin. While at college there, Durcan was committed to St. John of God Hospital. In the 1970s, Durcan studied archaeology and medieval history at University College Cork.

Career

In 1966, Durcan moved to London, where he worked with fellow Irish poet Michael Hartnett as a security guard at the North Thames Gas Board.{{cite web |url=http://www.ricorso.net/rx/az-data/authors/d/Durcan_P/life.htm |first=Bruce |last=Stewart |title=Paul Durcan |website=Ricorso: A Knowledge of Irish Literature |access-date=22 June 2010}}{{cite news |last=O'Reilly |first=Caitriona |author-link=Caitriona O'Reilly |date=26 January 2008 |title=A sharp and subtle voice |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2008/jan/26/poetry2 |access-date=22 June 2010 |newspaper=The Guardian}}{{cite news |last=Dwyer |first=Ciara |date=18 October 2009 |title=Laughter lines that come with a dark side |url=https://independent.ie/life/laughter-lines-that-come-with-a-dark-side/26574471.html |access-date=22 June 2010 |newspaper=Irish Independent}}

Durcan's main published collections include: A Snail in my Prime, Crazy About Women, Greetings to Our Friends in Brazil and Cries of an Irish Caveman. He appeared on the 1990 Van Morrison album Enlightenment, giving an idiosyncratic vocal performance on the song, "In the Days Before Rock 'N' Roll", which he also co-wrote.

In 2003, he published a collection of his weekly addresses to the nation, Paul Durcan's Diary, on the RTÉ Radio 1 programme Today with.... Between 2004 and 2007, Durcan was the third Ireland Professor of Poetry.{{cite web |title=Professor Paul Durcan |url=http://irelandchairofpoetry.org/previous-professors/professor-paul-durcan/ |access-date=2 October 2017 |website=Ireland Chair of Poetry}} He was a founding member of Aosdána in 1981. A number of his poems are studied by Irish students for the Leaving Certificate. He was shortlisted in 2005 for the Poetry Now Award for his collection, The Art of Life. In 2009, he was conferred with an honorary degree by Trinity College Dublin.{{cite news |last=Cullen |first=Paul |date=11 December 2009 |title=Durcan among four awarded degree |url=https://www.irishtimes.com/news/durcan-among-four-awarded-degree-1.850550 |url-access=subscription |access-date=2 October 2017 |newspaper=The Irish Times}} Durcan was the Ireland Fund Artist-in-Residence in the Celtic Studies Department of St. Michael's College at the University of Toronto in October 2009.{{cite web |title=SMC Sponsored Programs {{!}} Celtic Studies {{!}} Ireland Fund Artist-in-Residence Program |url=https://stmikes.utoronto.ca/students/celtic-artist-in-residence |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170929001022/https://stmikes.utoronto.ca/students/celtic-artist-in-residence/ |archive-date=29 September 2017 |access-date=28 September 2017 |website=University of St. Michael's College}} In 2011, Durcan was conferred with an honorary doctorate from University College Dublin.{{cite web |date=20 June 2011 |title=UCD honours Ireland Chairs of Poetry among Bloomsday conferrings and awards Ulysses Medal to Seamus Heaney |url=https://www.ucd.ie/news/2011/06JUN11/200611-UCD-honours-Ireland-Chairs-of-Poetry-among-Bloomsday-conferrings.html |access-date=2 October 2017 |website=University College Dublin}}

File:Paul Durcan 2018.png

Personal life and death

Durcan met Nessa O'Neill, from Dublin, at a wedding at the Shangri la Hotel in 1967; they married the next year and had two daughters . Initially they lived in Barcelona then London, returning to Ireland they moved to Cork, where Nessa qualified as a teacher and taught in Cork prison. The marriage ended in early 1984.

Paul had a son Michael John O'Neill in 1988 with another partner, he lived in Ringsend in Dublins docklands for 35 years, from where he travelled and gave poetry performances all over the world. In the last years of his life, Durcan was in poor health and the National Library of Ireland received his collected papers in 2024.{{Cite web |last=Ryan |first=Órla |date=17 May 2025 |title=Acclaimed poet Paul Durcan dies aged 80 |url=https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/2025/05/17/acclaimed-poet-paul-durcan-dies-aged-80/ |url-access=subscription |access-date=17 May 2025 |website=The Irish Times}} He died on 17 May 2025, at the age of 80 and following a traditional Ringsend funeral, he was buried in the old section of Aughavale cemetery in Westport, County Mayo.{{Cite web |last=Sheehan |first=Maeve |date=17 May 2025 |title=Tributes flow for ‘unflinchingly honest’ poet Paul Durcan on his death at age 80 |url=https://m.independent.ie/irish-news/tributes-flow-for-unflinchingly-honest-poet-paul-durcan-on-his-death-at-age-80/a2142551109.html |access-date=18 May 2025 |website=Irish Independent}}{{Cite web |last=McGuirk |first=Colm |date=18 May 2025 |title=Tributes pour in after death of acclaimed poet Paul Durcan |url=https://extra.ie/2025/05/18/news/irish-news/paul-durcan-rip |access-date=18 May 2025 |website=Extra.ie}}

Awards

1974 – Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Award
1989 – Irish American Cultural Institute Poetry Award
1990 – The Whitbread Award (for Daddy, Daddy)
Poetry Book Society choice for The Berlin Wall Café
2001 – Cholmondeley Award{{Cite web |title=Cholmondeley Awards |url=https://societyofauthors.org/prizes/the-soa-awards/cholmondeley-awards/ |access-date=17 May 2025 |website=Society of Authors}}

Works

Endsville, with Brian Lynch (New Writers Press, 1967)
O Westport in the Light of Asia Minor (Anna Livia Press, 1975)
Sam's Cross (Profile Press, 1978)
Teresa's Bar (Gallery Press, 1976; revised edition, Gallery Press, 1986)
Jesus, Break his Fall (Raven Arts Press, 1980)
Ark of the North (Raven Arts Press, 1982)
The Selected Paul Durcan (edited by Edna Longley, Blackstaff Press, 1982)
Jumping the Train Tracks with Angela (Raven Arts Press/Carcanet New Press, 1983)
The Berlin Wall Café (Blackstaff Press, 1985)
Going Home to Russia (Blackstaff Press, 1987)
Daddy, Daddy (Blackstaff Press, 1990)
Crazy About Women (National Gallery of Ireland, 1991)
A Snail in My Prime: New and Selected Poems, (Harvill Secker / Blackstaff Press, 1993)
Give Me Your Hand (MacMillan, 1994)
Christmas Day (Harvill Press, 1997)
Greetings to Our Friends in Brazil (Harvill Press, 1999)
Cries of an Irish Caveman (Harvill Press, 2001)
The Art of Life (Harvill Press, 2004)
The Laughter of Mothers (Harvill Press, 2007)
Life Is a Dream: 40 Years Reading Poems 1967-2007 (Random House UK, 2009)
Praise In Which I Live And Move And Have My Being (Harvill Secker, 2012)
The Days of Surprise (Harvill Secker, 2015)
Wild, Wild Erie: Poems Inspired by Paintings and Sculpture in the Toledo Museum of Art, Ohio (Toledo Museum of Art, 2016)

=Diary=

This collection gives a previously unseen view of Durcan's work and a more personal view of him and his poetry. It gives an insight into his childhood.{{cite book |last=Goarzin |first=Anne |year=2010 |chapter=Paul Durcan's Unsettled Poetry |editor-first=Ciarán |editor-last=Ross |title=Sub-Versions: Trans-National Readings of Modern Irish Literature |publisher=Rodopi |location=Amsterdam |pages=161–177 |isbn=978-9-04202-828-9}}