The Mud Vision

Heaney pursues the anonymity of his parable format but let it be known via his contribution to an Irish Hospice Foundation book published a month after his death in 2013 that The Mud Vision is a poem embedded in memories of life in an older Ireland but it also gestures towards an Ireland that is still coming into being. It has its origins in certain incidents in my personal past and has its meaning in intimations of what seems to be happening in the national psyche, at present and for the future. The circumstances and triggers that led to the poem, Heaney’s further responses, the thoughts of other commentators and press reports are fascinating. This commentary is followed by a comprehensive Background […]