Life
1949- [Thomas Neilson Paulin]; b. Leeds, raised Belfast; ed. Annadale
Grammar School; Belfast; University of Hull (during Larkin’s Librarianship)
and Oxford; lecturer at Nottingham Univ.; published critical study of
Hardy (1975); contrib. The Honest Ulsterman; incl. in Poetry
Introduction 3 (Penguin); poetry awards incl. Eric Gregory Major Award,
1976; Somerset Maugham Award, 1978 [err. 1977]; joint winner of Geoffrey
Faber Memorial Prize, 1982, with Paul Muldoon; Reader in Poetry at Nottingham
University, and visiting lecturer at University of Virginia; Liberty
Tree (1983), assails narrowmindedness of Protestant Unionism; Writing
to the Moment (1996); currently at Hertford College, Oxford; gave
T. S. Memorial Lecture at Canterbury, on Hazlitt (whose father was an
Ulster Unitarian), Nov. 1996, published as The Day-Star of Liberty:
William Hazlitt’s Radical Style (1998); his writings reveal an
utopian desire for ‘a sweet equal republic’; appears regularily
in BBC2 Late Review; pro-Palestinian and anti-settler
remarks made to a to Egyptian newspaper stirs up fracas in British and
international press, April 2002; issued The Invasion Book (2002), a topical sequence, and The Road to Inver (2004), being translations, versions and imitations, 1975-2003; presents Pen/Cross award to Seamus Heaney, Dublin, Feb. 2005.
DIW DIL ORM FDA HAM OCIL
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Works
Poetry, Theoretical Locations (Belfast: Ulsterman Publications
1975); A State of Justice (London: Faber & Faber 1977; rep.
1977); The Strange Museum (London: Faber & Faber 1980; 1987),
51pp.; The Book of Juniper (Bloodaxe 1982) [BNB 1981], ill. [drawings
Noel Connor]; Liberty Tree (Faber & Faber 1983), 78pp. [incls.
‘And Where Do You Stand on the National Question?’, pp.67-70];
Fivemiletown (London: Faber & Faber 1987); Selected Poems
1972-1990 (London: Faber & Faber 1993 [1st ed.]), [119]120pp.;
also Walking a Line (London: Faber & Faber 1994), 128pp.; The
Invasion Book (London: Faber & Faber 2002), 201pp.; The Road to Inver: Translations, Versions and Imitations 1975-2003 (London: Faber & Faber 2004), 128pp.
Plays, The Riot Act (London: Faber & Faber 1985) [version of Sophocles’ Antigone]; The Hillsborough Script: A Dramatic Satire (London: Faber & Faber 1987); Seize the Fire (London: Faber & Faber 1990), [65]77pp. [version of Aeschylus’ Prometheus Bound].
Criticism, Thomas Hardy, The Poetry of Perception (London: Macmillan 1975); ‘A Necessary Provincialism, Brian Moore, Maurice Leitch, Florence Mary McDowell’ pp.244-56, in Douglas Dunn, ed., Two Decades of Irish Writing (1975), [q.p.]; A New Look at the Language Question [Field Day pamphlet No. 1] (Derry: Field Day Co. 1983); Ireland and the English Crisis (Newcastle upon Tyne: Bloodaxe 1984), 222pp., with index [ORM 1985 err.] [ded. ‘for Brian Friel and Stephen Rea, founders of Field Day’; incl. ‘Paisley’s Progress’, and scathing article on Conor Cruise O’Brien as Catholic Unionist]; Minotaur, Poetry and the Nation State (London: Faber & Faber 1992), 298pp. [essays]; Writing to the Moment: Selected Critical Essays 1980-1996 (London: Faber & Faber 1996), 318pp. [incl. ‘The British Presence in Ulysses’; ‘Paisley’s Progress’, and essays on Ted Hughes, Gerard Manley Hopkins, et al.]; The Day-Star of Liberty: William Hazlitt’s Radical Style (London: Faber & Faber 1998), 368pp.
Anthologies, Ed. Faber Book of Political Verse (London: Faber & Faber 1986), and Faber Book of Vernacular Verse (London: Faber & Faber 1990), 404pp.; also Paulin, ed., Henry James, Selected Tales (1975; rep. 1987).
Miscellaneous, review of Barbara Coulton, Louis MacNeice at the BBC, in Times Literary Supplement (16 May 1980); ‘Clare in Babylon’, review of Mark Storey ed., Letters of John Clare, in Times Literary Supplement (20 June 1986), pp.675-76; review of Elizabeth Bishop, One Art, Selected Letters, in Times Literary Supplement (29 April 1994) [see Robert Giroux’s letter of 20 May. seq.]; ‘Undesirable’, review of Anthony Julius, T. S. Eliot: Anti-Semitism and Literary Form, in London Review of Books (9 May 1996), pp.12-15; ‘Bournemouth, after Verlaine’, [poem], in Times Literary Supplement (29 Jan. 1999), p.35; ‘The Cadence in the Song’, review-essay on Complete Poems of Christina Rossetti, in Times Literary Supplement (18 Jan. 2002), p.3; ; ‘Prologue’ [poem], in London Review of Books (25 Jan. 2001), p.13; ‘Many Cunning Passages: How Maynard Keynes Made His Mark on The Waste Land’, in Times Literary Supplement (29 Nov. 2002), p.14-15; ‘The Vernacular City’, in Nicholas Allen & Aaron Kelly, ed., The Cities of Belfast (Four Courts Press 2003),[q.pp.]. See also review of David Gilmour, The Long Recessional: The Imperial Life of Rudyard Kipling (London: John Murray), 362pp. [q.v.; c.2001].
Discography, Seamus Heaney and Tom Paulin (Faber Poetry Cassettes 1983). Uncollected poetry incl. ‘The Argument at Great Tew’, in London Review of Books, 4, 20 (4-17 Nov. 982), p.19, and Irish University Review, 13, 1 (Spring 1983), pp.83-85.
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Criticism
Interview in Viewpoints, Poets in Conversation with John Haffenden
(London: Faber & Faber 1981), pp.157-73.
Terry Eagleton, ‘The Poetry of Radical Republicanism’, rev. of Tom Paulin, ed., The Faber Book of Political Verse, in New Left Review, 158 (1986), pp.123-27.
Adrian Frazier, ‘Juniper, Otherwise Known: Poems by Paulin and Muldoon’ [review of Liberty Tree and Quoof], in Éire-Ireland, 19, 1 (Spring 1984), pp.123-44.
Edna Longley, ‘Poetry and Politics in Northern Ireland, in The Crane Bag, 9, 1 (1985), pp.26-40.
Bernard O’Donoghue, ‘Tom Paulin: Theoretical Locations and Public Positions’, in Verse, 3, 3 (1987), pp.29-39.
‘Q & A with Tom Paulin’, interview with Eamonn Hughes, Irish Literary Supplement (1988), pp.31-32.
Bernard O’Donoghue, ‘Involved Imaginings’, Tom Paulin’, in Neil Corcoran, ed., The Chosen Ground, Essays on the Contemporary Poetry of Northern Ireland (Bridgend: Seren Books 1992), pp.171-88.
Bernard O’Donoghue, ‘Involved Imaginings: Tom Paulin’, in Neil Corcoran, ed., The Chosen Ground: Essays on the Contemporary Poetry of Northern Ireland (Brigend, Mid Glamorgan: Seren Books; Dufour 1992), pp.171-87.
Elmer Kennedy-Andrews, ‘Tom Paulin, Underground Resistance Fighter’, in Michael Kenneally, ed., Poetry in Contemporary Irish Literature [Studies in Contemporary Irish Literature 2] (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe, 1995), pp.329-43.
Peter McDonald, ‘History and Poetry: Derek Mahon and Tom Paulin’, in Elmer Kennedy-Andrews, ed., Contemporary Irish Poetry: A Collection of Critical Essays (Macmillan 1996), pp.86-106.
Anthony Roche, ‘Northern Irish Drama: Imagining Alternatives’, in Contemporary Irish Drama From Beckett to McGuinness (Dublin: Gill & Macmillan 1995), pp.216-78, espec. pp.255-65.
Seamus Heaney, ‘John Clare’s Prog’, Redress of Poetry (London: Faber & Faber & Faber 1995), pp.80-81.
Sarah Fulford, ‘The Strangeness of the Script: Tom Paulin in Conversation’, in Irish Studies Review, No. 19 (Summer 1997), pp.2-4.
Declan Kiberd, ‘The importance of Style’, review of The Day-Star of Liberty: William Hazlitt’d Radical Prose, in The Irish Times (13 June 1998).
Paul Keegan, review The Day-Star of Liberty: William Hazzlitt’s Radical Style, in Times Literary Supplement (24 July, 1998), p.3-5.
Colin Graham, ‘Putting on the Style’, review of The Wind Dog, in The Irish Times (Weekend, 1 April 2000).
George Szirtes, review of Tom Paulin, The Invasion Book, in The Irish Times, Weekend (6 Feb. 2002), p.11.
Helen Meany, ‘Engaging with the Enemy’, interview with Tom Paulin, in The Irish Times (30 March, 2002) [Weekend].
Nicholas Laird, ‘The Poet’s Ulcer’, review of The Invasion Book, in Times Literary Supplement [28 June 2002).
Judith Shulevitz, ‘Senescent Prejudices’. review of The Invasion Book, in NY Times Book Review (1 Dec. 2003), p.23.
Nick Topping, review of The Road to Inver, in Fortnight [Belfast] (Feb. 2005), p.29.
Query, Seamus Deane, ‘Black Mountain Jacobin’, review of Tom Paulin, The Liberty Tree, Honest Ulsterman, No.74 [q.d.], p.49.
Anthony Roche, Contemporary Irish Drama (Dublin: Gill & Macmillan 1995), p.258f.
Nicholas Murray, review of Writing to the Moment, in Times Literary Supplement (29. Nov. 1996), p.26.
Paul Keegan, review The Day-Star of Liberty: William Hazlitt’s Radical Style (Faber & Faber 1998), 368pp., Times Literary Supplement, 24 July, 1998, p.3-5.
Declan Kiberd, ‘The importance of Style’, review of The Day-Star of Liberty: William Hazlitt’d Radical Prose (Faber & Faber 1998), in The Irish Times, 13 June 1998.
George Szirtes, review of Tom Paulin, The Invasion Book (London: Faber & Faber), 201pp., in Irish Times, Weekend, 6 Feb. 2002, p.11.
Steven Matthews, ‘Protestant Vocables’, review of Tom Paulin, The Wind Dog, in Times Literary Supplement (25 February 2000), , p.23.
Colin Graham, ‘Putting on the Style’, review of The Wind Dog, in The Irish Times (Weekend, 1 April 2000).
Nicholas Laird, ‘The Poet’s Ulcer’, review of The Invasion Book, in Times Literary Supplement [28 June 2002].
Judith Shulevitz, ‘Senescent Prejudices’. review of The Invasion Book, in NY Times Book Review (1.12.2003).
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Notes
Seamus Deane, gen. ed., Field Day Anthology of Irish Writing
(Derry: Field Day 1991), Vol. 2, selects from The Strange Museum;
Liberty Tree; Fivemiletown, [1406-10]; BIOG 1435. ADD COMM,
Caroline MacDonagh, ‘The Image of the Big House in the Poetry of
Derek Mahon and Tom Paulin’, in Jacqueline Genet, ed., The Big
House in Ireland (Dingle: Brandon; NY: Barnes & Noble 1991), pp.289-303.
Andrew Carpenter & Peter Fallon, eds., The Writers: A Sense of Place (Dublin: O’Brien Press 1980), selects ‘Desertmartin: A Poem’ (pp.186); also photo-port.
Blake Morrison & Andrew Motion, eds., The Penguin Book of Contemporary British Poetry (Harmondsworth: Penguin 1982), contains “Settlers”, “Under the Eyes”, “Provincial Narratives”, “In a Northern Landscape”, “Dawros Parish Church”, “Trotsky in Finland”, “Anastasia McLaughlin”, “The Harbour in the Evening”, “Second-Rate Republics”, “A Lyric Afterwards” (pp.116-24.)
Books in Print (1994), Theoretical Locations (Belfast: Ulsterman Publications 1975) [0 903048 06 X]; A State of Justice (London: Faber & Faber 1977) [0 571 10982 9]; Personal Column (Belfast: Ulsterman 1978); The Strange Museum (London: Faber & Faber 1980; rep. 1987) [0 571 11511 X]; The Book of Juniper (Newcastle: Bloodaxe 1982) [BNB 1981], ill. Noel Connor [0 90642 716 9]; Liberty Tree (London: Faber & Faber 1983) [UUC ?ERR 1981] [0 571 13025 9]; Fivemiletown (London: Faber & Faber 1987), 67pp. [0 571 14914 6] [US CONGRESS CAT. NOT REG. IN BNB]; Selected Poems 1972-1990 (London: Faber & Faber 1993) [0 571 14941 3]; Walking a Line (London: Faber & Faber 1994) [0 571 17081 1]; also The Argument at Great Tew (Willbrook Press [n.d]) [0 948693 00 2]; Ted Hughes, Laureate of the Free Market? (Kenneth Allott Lectures] (Liverpool Classical Monthly 1991) [1 87125 25 7]; A New Look at the Language Question (Field Day 1983) [0 946755 00 0]; Ireland and the English Crisis (Newcastle upon Tyne: Bloodaxe 1984) [0 906427 64 9]; Minotaur, Poetry and the Nation State (1992) [0 571 16308 4]
Hibernia Books (Cat. No 19) lists Two Poems in Honest Ulsterman (June 1973); Two Poems in Honest Ulsterman (June 1976); Personal Column [Ulsterman 1978]
Stormont is a lonely symbol of Ulster Protestant nationalism since
there is ‘very little in the way of an indigenous cultural tradition
of its own’ in Ulster Protestantism.’ (Ireland and the English
Crisis, 1984, p.17; see Brian J. Graham, ‘No Place of the Mind,
Contested Protestant Representation of Ulster’, in Ecumene, Journal
of Environment, Culture, Meaning, 1.3, (1994), p.265-66.
‘Ireland’s Liberty Tree’ [a 5 stanza ballad], is copied in A. N. Jeffares, A New Commentary to the Poems of W. B. Yeats (1984), pp.194: ‘A tree has been planted in Ireland,/And watered with tears of the brave;/By our Great-grandsires it was nourished,/Who scorned to be held like the slaves./The trust they transported to their children/To keep it until they were free/And yearly the plant has grown stronger/’Tis called “Ireland’s Liberty Tree!”’//Chorus:] Protect then, the tree, sons of Erin,/Its branches from traitors keep free,/Though Martyrs before ye have perished/’Neath Ireland’s famed Liberty-Tree.’
Ian Adamson’s Cruthin books lauded by Tom Paulin as revealing ‘an attitude of mind which is modern, non-sectarian and egalitarian.’ [The Books Ireland reviewer, Mar 1993, defers from this judgement, placing the books in question next or in the UDA camp.] NOTE that Roy Foster’s Paddy and Mr Punch (1993) is dedicated to Paulin.
Neil Corcoran takes his title for a collection of critical essays on Northern Irish poets (Brigend 1882) from Tom Paulin’s ‘the chosen ground’ in “The Caravans at Lüneberg Heath” (Fivemiletown, 1987).
Walt Whitman is chosen by Paulin choses in his ‘International Books of the Year’ choice [TLS, 4 Dec 1993], remarking on the lack of celebration for his liberated modern consciousness an benevolent Republicanism in his centenary year in America, calling him ‘the last poet of the good old cause’. In the same column, Paul Muldoon confesses his admiration for Julian Barnes.
Anthony Thwaite’s edition of The Larkin Letters is the subject of a letter from Paulin in Times Literary Supplement (6 Nov. 1992).
Paulin’s poetry is not included in Edna Longley, ed., The Bloodaxe Book of Twentieth Century Poetry from Britain and Ireland, ed. Edna Longley (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Bloodaxe Books 2001).
Roy Foster selects, inter al., Tom Paulin, The Invasion Handbook (Faber), on which he comments: ‘Tacking across Europe in a scatter-gun montage of discordant and challenging voices and visions, from the Treatyof Versailles to the phoney war, it demands rereading and promises to build into something completely new’ (‘Books of the Year’ [column], Times Literary Supplement, 6 Dec. 2002).
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Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)