Description:
Poetry and Peace explores Longley's and Heaney's poetic fidelity to the imagination and their creation, through poetry, of a powerful cultural and sacred space.
Brief description:
Richard Rankin Russell is professor of English and director of graduate studies in English at Baylor University. He is the author of Bernard MacLaverty and Martin McDonagh: A Casebook.
Review Quotes:
". . . Russell does show that Longley and Heaney have contributed appreciably to the peace process in Northern Ireland through their poetry, which remaining utterly faithful to its own autonomy, creates a discourse that escaped the violence and vengeance that have marked Northern Ireland since the Troubles. It does so by creating an imaginative space for the other and by emphasizing the shared cultural patrimony of the province. Russell luminously illustrates how Longley's and Heaney's emphasis on the legacy shared by Protestants and Catholics opens a way past the cycle of carnage and settling of scores; this emphasis affirms a community that includes all those once excluded by sectarian fury and mania." --Peace Review: A Journal of Social Justice