Seamus Heaney wins Forward Poetry Prize for Human Chain
Ireland Literature Exchange wishes to extend warm congratulations to Seamus Heaney, who was awarded the 2010 Forward Poetry Prize for his most recent collection, Human Chain. The Northern Irish writer had been nominated for the prize three times before, but this is his first win. The award comes with a cheque for £10,000.
The collection of poems is informed by his experience of suffering a stroke four years ago and judge and author Ruth Padel praised Heaney's volume as 'painful, honest, and delicately weighted'.
The Forward Poetry Prizes were launched in 1991 to bring the public's attention to contemporary poetry. They are the richest annual awards in the UK, with a total prize value of £16,000, to reward both established and up-and-coming poets.
Heaney's previous nominations at the Forward Prize came in 1996, for The Spirit Level, and in 2006, for District and Circle. Heaney has also won the Nobel Prize for Literature and the TS Eliot Prize, and has been made Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
Seamus Heaney's poetry has been translated into many languages and Ireland Literature Exchange is delighted to have supported translations of his poetry and prose into Italian, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Hungarian, Lithuanian, Ukrainian, Polish, Slovak, Czech and German. ILE was also honoured by Seamus' attendance at a recent event in Dublin, 'Chrysanthemums and the Full Moon', at which three visiting Polish translators, Jerzy Jarniewicz, Piotr Sommer and Renata Senktas and Irish poet, Peter Sirr and Professor Michael Cronin discussed the art of translation.