THE AMERICAN poets Thomas Lynch and Michael Heffernan will launch their new poetry collections this Saturday at 6.30pm in Charlie Byrne’s Bookshop.
The launch is being organised by Salmon Poetry, publisher of both books. The poets will read from their work and sign copies of their books.
Thomas Lynch’s new collection, The Sin-eater: A Breviary, contains a series of 24 line poems and examine the nature of religious experience, faith and doubt, communion, and atonement. The Chicago Tribune called the book a “luminous, humane collection that sees religion as a question mark, not a period”.
Lynch is a poet, songwriter, and photographer. His work has appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Harper’s, Esquire, Newsweek, The Irish Times, and The Times. His commentaries have been recorded and broadcast by BBC Radio and RTÉ. He is an adjunct professor in the graduate creative writing programme at the University of Michigan,
The Breaking Of The Day is Michael Heffernan’s 10th book and his fourth from Salmon. His previous titles include The Cry of Oliver Hardy (1979 ); The Man at Home (1988 ); Love’s Answer (1994 ); The Night Breeze Off the Ocean (2005 ); The Odor of Sanctity (2008 ) and At the Bureau of Divine Music (2011 ).
His work has earned three fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts (US ), two Pushcart Prizes, and the Porter Prize for Literary Excellence. He teaches poetry in the master of fine arts programme in creative writing at the University of Arkansas.
He has a long association with Galway, having being involved in the NUI Galway/University of Arkansas summer writing programmes in the 1980s and 1990s.
