Seamus  Heaney

Seamus  Heaney, (1939- ). Irish poet and critic. The son of farmers in Northern Ireland, he was educated in Belfast and began to publish in the 1960s. While such early collections as Death of a Naturalist (1966) explore his rural upbringing and family history, later poems, such as those in North (1975), Field Work (1979), and Station Island (1984) deal with complex themes from Irish history and culture. He became an Irish citizen in 1972. A respected critic, he was appointed professor of poetry at Oxford University in 1989. Recent publications include the bestselling poetry volume Seeing Things (1991) and the essays in The Redress of Poetry (1995). Heaney was awarded the Nobel prize in 1995.