After the Titanic A Life of Derek Mahon

After the Titanic A Life of Derek Mahon by Stephen Enniss arrived today and it makes an amazing read.  Stephen Enniss is a distinguished librarian and archivist who goes through the 'Battlefield of Mahon's life in this biography', according to McCarthy.  He believes that 'Enniss is uniquely placed to check through the wreckage of most Irish poetry.'

According to McCarthy 'Derek Mahon is a genius of a poet. Instinctively lyrical like his true soul-mates Van Morrison and Louis MacNeice, his politics is unexpectedly Irish. One would have thought that like our number one golfer, Rory, he would feel more British than Irish, but he has deflected both the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry and an OBE from Tony Blair’s government. “Northern Ireland is sick unto death, perhaps because at a deep level it knows it shouldn’t exist,” he said to Paul Durcan in a very early Magill interview, and in preparation for an American reading, he warned his publisher that he was not to be introduced as an Ulster poet but ‘Irish, please.’  (Cited in http://www.irishexaminer.com/lifestyle/artsfilmtv/books/life-of-poet-is-work-in-progress-290644.html.  Accessed 11th February 2015).