Influential Irish poet Paul Durcan dies aged 80

Irish Examiner

17-05-2025

The renowned poet Paul Durcan has died at the age of 80, his family confirmed.
Born in Dublin in 1944, Mr Durcan published more than 20 books over his lengthy career, including the collections
A Snail in My Prime, Crazy About Women, Greetings to Our Friends in Brazil, Cries of an Irish Caveman,
and T
he Berlin Wall Café.
His work also saw him garner numerous awards, including the Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Award in 1974, the Irish American Cultural Institute Poetry Award in 1989, the Whitbread Prize in 1990, and the London Poetry Book Society Choice.
Many of his poems have been featured on the Leaving Certificate English syllabus.
Mr Durcan turned 80 just last year. A collection of his work titled 80 at 80, edited by Niall MacMonagle, was published to mark the occasion.
In his introduction to the collection, which was also published in The Irish Times, writer Colm Tóibín described Paul Durcan's work as 'daring, directly personal as well as directly political.'
"Durcan's public poems are risk-taking explorations of the intersection where tragedy and comedy meet in contemporary Ireland," he wrote.
"His poems are open forms filled by voices, often the voice of the poet himself or someone like him, or the voice of a persona he has created or a character he has made. Some of the narrative is shot through with surprise or delight or wonder at the strangeness of the world or the sheer sadness of things.
"At the centre of Durcan's poetic enterprise is an urge to destabilise and make us re-see what is odd and what is ordinary."
A member of Aosdána, the National Library of Ireland acquired Paul Durcan's archive in 2024.
In a statement, Mr Durcan's family said he would be 'sadly missed by [his wife] Nessa, his daughters Sarah and Síabhra, his son Michael, his sons-in-law, Mark and Blaise, his daughter-in-law, Linden, and his nine grandchildren.'
Funeral details will be announced at a later date, his family added.