Paul Muldoon
Paul Muldoon | |
---|---|
Born | Portadown, Northern Ireland |
Occupation | Poet, author, and writer |
Education | Queen's University Belfast (BA) |
Spouse | Jean Hanff Korelitz |
Website | |
Official website |
Paul Muldoon is an Irish poet.
He has published more than thirty collections and won a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and the T. S. Eliot Prize.
At
Life and work
Muldoon was born, the eldest of three children, on a farm in
It's a beautiful part of the world. It's still the place that's 'burned into the retina', and although I haven't been back there since I left for university 30 years ago, it's the place I consider to be my home. We were a fairly non-political household; my parents were nationalists, of course, but it was not something, as I recall, that was a major area of discussion. But there were patrols; an army presence; movements of troops; and a sectarian divide. And that particular area was a nationalist enclave, while next door was the parish where the Orange Order was founded; we'd hear the drums on summer evenings. But I think my mother, in particular, may have tried to shelter us from it all. Besides, we didn't really socialise a great deal. We were 'blow-ins' – arrivistes – new to the area, and didn't have a lot of connections.[6]
Talking of his home life, he continues: "I'm astonished to think that, apart from some Catholic Truth Society pamphlets, some books on saints, there were, essentially, no books in the house, except one set, the Junior World Encyclopaedia, which I certainly read again and again. People would say, I suppose, that it might account for my interest in a wide range of arcane bits of information. At some level, I was self-educated." He was a '"Troubles poet" from the beginning.[6]
In 1969, Muldoon read English at
For thirteen years (1973–86), Muldoon worked as an arts producer for the
Muldoon is married to novelist Jean Hanff Korelitz, whom he met at an Arvon writing course. He has two children, Dorothy and Asher, and lives primarily in New York City.[6][8]
Poetry and other works
His poetry is known for his difficult, sly, allusive style, casual use of obscure or archaic words, understated wit,
In 2003, Muldoon won the
Most of Muldoon's collections contain shorter poems with an inclusion of a long concluding poem. As Muldoon produced more collections, the long poems gradually took up more space in the volume, until in 1990 the poem Madoc: A Mystery took over the volume of that name, leaving only seven short poems to appear before it. Muldoon has not since published a poem of comparable length, but a new trend is emerging whereby more than one long poem appears in a volume.
Madoc: A Mystery, exploring themes of colonisation, is among Muldoon's most difficult works. It includes, as "poetry", such non-literary constructions as maps and geometric diagrams. In the book Irish Poetry since 1950, John Goodby states it is "by common consent, the most complex poem in modern Irish literature [...] – a massively ambitious, a historiographical
Muldoon has contributed the librettos for four operas by Daron Hagen: Shining Brow (1992), Vera of Las Vegas (1996), Bandanna (1998), and The Antient Concert (2005). His interests have not only included libretto, but rock lyric as well, penning lines for the band The Handsome Family as well as Warren Zevon whose title track "My Ride's Here" belongs to a Muldoon collaboration. Muldoon also writes lyrics for (and plays "rudimentary" rhythm guitar in) his own Princeton-based rock bands. Rackett (2004–2010)[14] was disbanded in 2010. Another of Muldoon's bands, Wayside Shrines,[15] has recorded and released thirteen of the lyrics included in Muldoon's collection of rock lyrics, Word on the Street. His current group is known as Rogue Oliphant.
Muldoon has also edited a number of anthologies, including The Lyrics: 1956 to the Present by Paul McCartney, published in 2021, written two children's books, translated the work of other authors, performed live at the
Awards
Muldoon has won the following major poetry awards:[17]
- 1990: Guggenheim Fellowship
- 1992: Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize for Madoc: A Mystery
- 1994: T. S. Eliot Prize for The Annals of Chile
- 1997: Irish Literature Prize for Poetry, for New Selected Poems 1968–1994
- 2002: T. S. Eliot Prize (shortlist) for Moy Sand and Gravel
- 2003: Griffin Poetry Prize (Canada) for Moy Sand and Gravel
- 2003: Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for Moy Sand and Gravel
- 2004: American Ireland Fund Literary Award
- 2004: Aspen Prize for Poetry
- 2004: Shakespeare Prize
- 2009: John William Corrington Award for Literary Excellence
- 2017: Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry
Selected honours
- Honorary Professor in the School of English at the University of St Andrews (Scotland)
- Professor of Poetry at OxfordUniversity 1999–2004 (England)
- Honorary Fellow of Hertford College, Oxford University (England)
- Fellowship with the Royal Society of Literature (England)
- Fellowship with the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (US)
- Awarded an honorary doctorate by Trinity College Dublin in 2014 (Ireland)[18]
Bibliography
Poetry: Main Collections
- New Weather (1973) Faber & Faber, London
- Mules (1977) Faber & Faber, London / Wake Forest University Press, Winston-Salem, N.C.
- Why Brownlee Left (1980) Faber & Faber, London / Wake Forest University Press, Winston-Salem, N.C.
- Quoof (1983) Faber & Faber, London / Wake Forest University Press, Winston-Salem, N.C.
- Meeting the British (1987) Faber & Faber, London / Wake Forest University Press, Winston-Salem, N.C.
- Madoc: A Mystery (1990) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York
- The Annals of Chile (1994) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York
- Hay (1998) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York
- Moy Sand and Gravel (2002) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York (Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and the Griffin Poetry Prize)
- Horse Latitudes (2006) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York (shortlisted for T. S. Eliot Prize)
- Maggot (2010) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York (shortlisted for 2011 Poetry Now Award)
- One Thousand Things Worth Knowing (2015) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York
- Frolic and Detour (2019) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York
- Howdie-Skelp (2021) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York
Poetry: Selected Editions
- Selected Poems 1968–1983 (1986) Faber & Faber, London
- Selected Poems 1968–1986 (1987) Ecco Press, New York
- New Selected Poems: 1968–1994 (1996) Faber & Faber, London
- Poems 1968–1998 (2001) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York
- Selected Poems 1968–2014 (2016) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York
- Dislocations: The Selected Innovative Poems of Paul Muldoon (2020) Liverpool University Press, Liverpool
Limited Editions and Booklets (poetry, prose, and translations)
- Knowing My Place (1971) Ulsterman Publications, Belfast
- Spirit of Dawn (1975) Ulsterman Publications, Belfast
- Names and Addresses (1978) Ulsterman Publications, Belfast
- Immram (1980) Gallery Press, Dublin
- The O-O's Party, New Year's Eve (1980) Gallery Press, Dublin
- Out of Siberia (1982) Gallery Press, Dublin
- The Wishbone (1984) Gallery Press, Dublin
- The Astrakhan Cloak (By Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill in Irish. Trans Muldoon.) (1992) Gallery Press, Dublin
- Shining Brow (1993) Faber & Faber, London
- The Prince of the Quotidian (1994) Gallery Press, Dublin
- Incantata (1994) Graphic Studio, Dublin
- Six Honest Serving Men (1995) Gallery Press, Dublin
- Kerry Slides (1996) Gallery Press, Dublin
- The Last Thesaurus (1996) Faber & Faber, London
- The Noctuary of Narcissus Batt (1997) Faber & Faber, London
- The Birds (Adaptation after Aristophanes) (1999) Gallery Press, Dublin
- Hopewell Haiku (1997) Warwick Press, Easthampton, Massachusetts [1]
- The Bangle (Slight Return) (1998) Typography Press, Princeton, N.J.
- Bandanna (1999) Faber & Faber, London
- The End of the Poem: 'All Souls Night' by WB Yeats (lecture) (2000) Oxford University Press, Oxford
- Vera of Las Vegas (2001) Gallery Press, Dublin
- Unapproved Road (2002) Pied Oxen Press, Hopewell, N.J.
- Medley for Morin Khur (2005) Enitharmon Press, London
- Sixty Instant Messages to Tom Moore (2005) Modern Haiku Press, Lincoln, Illinois
- General Admission (2006) Gallery Press, Dublin
- I Might Make Out With You (2006) Lori Bookstein, New York
- The End of the Poem: Oxford Lectures (2006) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York
- The Fifty Minute Mermaid (By Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill in Irish. Trans Muldoon.) (2007) Gallery Press, Dublin
- When the Pie was Opened (2008) Sylph Editions, Lewes, East Sussex
- Plan B (2009) Enitharmon Press, London [19]
- Wayside Shrines (2009) Gallery Press, Dublin
- Feet of Clay (2011) Four Candles Press, Oxford
- Epithalamium (2011) Emanon Press, Princeton, NJ
- Songs and Sonnets (2012) Enitharmon Press, London [20]
- The Word on the Street (2013) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York
- At Sixes and Sevens (2013) Stoney Road Press, Dublin
- Encheiresin Naturae (2015) Nawakun Press, Santa Rosa, CA
- Rising to the Rising (2016) Gallery Press, Dublin
- I Gave The Pope A Rhino (2017) Fine Poetry Press, Manchester (Illustrated by Paul Wright, published by Andrew J Moorhouse, Fine Press Poetry, 2017)
- Superior Aloeswood (2017) Enitharmon Press, London [21]
- Lamentations (2017) Gallery Press, Dublin
- Sadie and the Sadists (2017) Eyewear Publishing, London
- The Dead, 1904 (2018) Gallery Press, Dublin
- Binge (2020) Lifeboat Press, Belfast
- Sure Thing (2022) Lifeboat Press, Belfast
- Anthologies (edited)
- The Scrake of Dawn: Poems by Young People from Northern Ireland. Ed.(1979)
- Contemporary Irish Poetry: An Anthology. Ed. by Anthony Bradley (1980)
- The Faber Book of Contemporary Irish Poetry. Ed. (1986)
- The Faber Book of Beasts. Ed. (1997)
- The Oxford and Cambridge May Anthologies 2000: Poetry. Ed. (2000)
- The Best American Poetry 2005. (Ed. with David Lehman) (2005)
Criticism, book reviews and other contributions
- Muldoon, Paul (3 March 2014). "Capital case : the poetry of E. E. Cummings". The Critics. Books. The New Yorker. Vol. 90, no. 2. pp. 70–74.
- To Ireland, I (Clarendon Lectures of 1998) (2000) Oxford University Press, London
- The End of the Poem (Oxford Lectures) (2006) Faber & Faber, London / Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York
Interviews, critical studies and reviews of Muldoon's work
- Alonso, Alex, Paul Muldoon in America: Transatlantic Formations. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021.
- Holdridge, Jeff. The Poetry of Paul Muldoon. Dublin: Liffey Press, 2009.
- Keller, Lynn (Spring 1994). "An interview with Paul Muldoon". Contemporary Literature. 35 (1): 1–29. JSTOR 1208734.
- Kendall, Tim. Paul Muldoon. Chester Springs, PA: Dufour Editions, 1996.
- Randolph, Jody Allen. "Paul Muldoon, December 2009." Close to the Next Moment. Manchester: Carcanet, 2010.
- Redmond, John. "Interview with Paul Muldoon." Thumbscrew 4 Spring 1996.
- Sherman, Susan. "Yusef Komunyakaa and Paul Muldoon [Interview]." Bomb 65 Fall 1998.
- Wills, Clair. Reading Paul Muldoon. Newcastle upon Tyne: Bloodaxe, 1997.
See also
- List of Northern Irish writers
- Oxford Professor of Poetry
- Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
- Postmodernism
References
- ^ "Princeton University bequests". Archived from the original on 5 June 2010. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
- ^ "Princeton University listing". Archived from the original on 2 March 2009. Retrieved 15 September 2019.
- ^ "Poetry Society". Archived from the original on 4 May 2009. Retrieved 15 September 2019.
- ^ "Biography". Retrieved 15 September 2019.
- ^ The New York Times profile "Word Freak", 19 November 2006.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i The Guardian Profile The poet at play, 12 May 2001. Retrieved 27 February 2010.
- ^ Cambridge in America: Poetry, Conversation & Irish Whiskey, 8 October 2013. Retrieved 21 September 2013.
- ^ "The Poetry of Downsizing". The New York Times, 22 December 2013. Accessed 12 October 2014.
- ISBN 1-85224-348-1.
- ^ "Darkness at Muldoon", The New York Times review, 13 October 2002. Accessed 27 February 2010.
- ^ For an extended discussion of the poem see: Goodby, John (2000), Irish poetry since 1950: from stillness into history Manchester University Press, p. 296.
- ^ "Paul Muldoon". Poetry Foundation. 14 September 2019. Retrieved 15 September 2019.
- ^ "Madoc by Paul Muldoon". completereview.org. Retrieved 27 May 2009.
I cannot help feeling that this time (Muldoon) has gone too far – so far, at least, that I can hardly make him out at all, off there in the distance, dancing by himself.
- ^ Val Nolan, 'Lets go make some noise!', The Stinging Fly, Volume 2, Issue 8 (Dublin: Winter 2007/08), pp. 11–13; Feature on Paul Muldoon’s band Rackett, specifically their concert at the Róisín Dubh, Galway, during their 2007 Irish tour.
- ^ "Waysideshrines.org". waysideshrines.org. Retrieved 15 September 2019.
- ^ "Poetry Brothel puts the bawd in bard". The Guardian. 28 October 2014. Retrieved 22 February 2017.
- ^ From Paul Muldoon at British Council: Literature
- ^ "Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Paul Muldoon explores rights of artist in public lecture". Trinity News and Events. 31 October 2018. Retrieved 27 January 2020.
- ^ "Plan B". Enitharmon Editions. Retrieved 15 September 2019.
- ^ "Songs and Sonnets – Paul Muldoon". Enitharmon Editions. Retrieved 15 September 2019.
- ^ "Superior Aloeswood". Enitharmon Editions. Retrieved 15 September 2019.
External links
- Official website
- James S. F. Wilson (Spring 2004). "Paul Muldoon, The Art of Poetry No. 87". The Paris Review. Spring 2004 (169).
- Paul Muldoon discusses poetry with Wunderkammer Magazine 17 January 2011 (Video, 20 mins)
- Paul Muldoon reads "Wulf and Eadwacer" from The Word Exchange: Anglo-Saxon Poems in Translation (audio)
- Paul Muldoon at the Key West Literary Seminar, 2010: "The Borderline" (Audio)
- Poetry Foundation profile and poems Accessed 2010-02-27
- Profile at Poets.org
- Poetry Archive biography (U.K.) Accessed 2010-02-27
- The Guardian article – Extended interview with Muldoon and analysis The poet at play 12 May 2001 Accessed 2010-02-27
- Poetry Society essays on Muldoon Accessed 2010-02-27
- Transcript of interview with ABC Radio National, March 2008. Accessed 2010-02-27
- Griffin Poetry Prize biography Accessed 2010-08-27
- "Word Freak". Profile of Muldoon in The New York Times Magazine. Accessed 2010-02-27
- Archival Material at Leeds University Library
- Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library, Emory University: Paul Muldoon papers, 1939–2016