Greg Delanty facts for kids
Greg Delanty (born in 1958) is an Irish poet. A special issue of the British magazine Agenda was even dedicated to his work!
About Greg Delanty
Greg Delanty was born in Cork City, Ireland. While he is known as an Irish poet, he also has strong ties to Vermont and the United States. He lives in America for most of the year and is a special poet-in-residence at Saint Michael's College in Vermont. He became an American citizen in 1994 but kept his Irish citizenship too. He used to be the president of a group called the Association of Literary Scholars, Critics, and Writers.
The Irish writer Colum McCann once called Delanty the "poet laureate" (which means a special, honored poet) for Irish people living in America. McCann said that Delanty has written about a whole generation of people who moved away from Ireland.
Greg Delanty studied at University College Cork (UCC). He learned from famous poets like Sean Lucy and John Montague. Many other well-known writers also studied there at the same time, including Maurice Riordan, Gregory O'Donoghue, Thomas McCarthy, William Wall, Gerry Murphy, and Seán Dunne. Poets who wrote in the Irish language, such as Liam Ó Muirthile, Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill, Louis DePaor, and Colm Breathnach, were also very important to him.
His Writing Journey
While at UCC, Greg Delanty was the editor of the university's magazine, Quarryman. He published his very first poems in The Cork Examiner. As an editor, he was the first in Ireland to publish poems in both Irish and English without translations. He also asked other students and poets from Ireland and beyond, like Seamus Heaney and Paul Durcan, to share their poems.
In 1983, Delanty won the important Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Award. This award is given to an Irish poet who hasn't published a book yet. In 1986, his first full book, Cast in the Fire, came out. That same year, he received the Allan Dowling Poetry Fellowship, which came with money and required him to travel to the United States.
Since 1987, Delanty has worked at Saint Michael's College in Vermont. He started as a teacher and is now the poet-in-residence. Here, his poems began to explore themes of moving away from home and family. His book American Wake (1995) imagined a special place where all Irish people who left their home would land. The Hellbox (1998) was named after a term from the printing world, a job his father did.
The Blind Stitch (2001) included poems about India. The Ship of Birth (2007) was inspired by becoming a father and celebrated the ongoing flow of life. His Collected Poems 1986-2006 was published in 2006.
After his collected poems, Delanty explored new styles and topics. His book The Greek Anthology, Book XVII (2012) used an old Greek poetry style to look at our modern world in new ways.
He also wrote The New Citizen Army, a book of political poems about war, climate change, and how our modern lives are connected to these issues. The covers of this book were even made from recycled uniforms of US soldiers! The book was designed by US military veterans. Another book, Loosestrife (2011), included many of the same poems.
Greg Delanty is the main poet in an anthology (a collection of writings) called So Little Time: Words and Images for a World in Climate Crisis (2014). The environmentalist Bill McKibben suggested the book focus on Delanty's poems. Delanty then suggested inviting other poets as well. Bill McKibben called him "The great Vermont poet." In 2006, The Sunday Times newspaper said that Delanty's poems mix political ideas with personal thoughts.
His poems are found in many anthologies from different countries, including America, Ireland, Italy, England, and Japan. They have appeared in important collections like The Norton Introduction to Poetry and The Penguin Book of Irish Poetry. His individual poems have been published in well-known magazines such as The Atlantic, New Statesman, and The Irish Times.
Greg Delanty also helped edit The Word Exchange: Anglo-Saxon Poems in Translation (2010) with Michael Matto. This book was very popular. He has also translated poems by other writers, including Seán Ó Ríordáin and Kyriakos Charalambides. He even translated two ancient Greek plays, The Knights by Aristophanes and Orestes by Euripides.
He co-edited Jumping Off Shadows: Selected Contemporary Irish Poetry (1995) with Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill. He also worked with Robert Welsh to edit The Selected Poems of Patrick Galvin (1995). Delanty has read his poems in many places across the United States and Europe, including the Library of Congress.
Many of his poems have been shared on radio and television, from The Writer's Almanac with Garrison Kellior to the BBC and Radio Teilifis Éireann (Irish National TV and Radio). He has also been interviewed many times. The National Library of Ireland has collected Greg Delanty's writings and papers up to 2010.
Awards and Recognition
Greg Delanty has received many awards for his poetry:
- Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Award (1983)
- Allen Dowling Poetry Fellowship (1986)
- Wolfers-O’Neill Award (1996–97)
- Austin Clarke Award (1996)
- National Poetry Competition Prizewinner (Poetry Society of England, 1999)
- Arts Council of Ireland Bursary (1998–99)
- Award from the Royal Literary Fund (1999)
- Guggenheim Fellowship for poetry (2007–2008)
