District & Circle: Poems

"The world shines up from these pages with refreshed particularity and tactile exactitude." —Peter Campion, The Boston Sunday Globe

In their haunted, almost visionary clarity, the poems of District and Circle, Seamus Heaney's critically acclaimed collection, assay the weight and worth of what has been held in the hand and in the memory. Scenes from a childhood spent far from the horrors of World War II are colored by a strongly contemporary sense that "Anything can happen," and other images from the dangerous present—a fireman's helmet, a journey on the Underground, a melting glacier—are fraught with the same anxiety. But the volume, which includes some "found prose" poems and several translations, offers resistance as the poet gathers his staying powers and stands his ground in the hiding places of love and excited language. With more relish and conviction than ever, Heaney maintains his trust in the obduracy of workaday realities and the mystery of everyday renewals.

"[Heaney's] voice carries the authenticity and believability of the plainspoken—even though (herein his magic) his words are anything but plainspoken. His stanzas are dense echo chambers of contending nuances and ricocheting sounds. And his is the gift of saying something extraordinary while, line by line, conveying a sense that this is something an ordinary person might actually say." —Brad Leithauser, The New York Times Book Review

"This is one of those remarkable books of poetry which demonstrates, with particular suddenness and clarity, what poems of the finest quality are really good for. They re-energise the language, and by doing so, they serve to quicken the reader's soul." — The Economist