Republic of rhyme

The Penguin Book of Irish Poetry

But anthologies of Irish poetry continue to appear and this tells us something about the perennial love of Irish poems in the world book trade.

Patrick Crotty, Fermoy-born and St Colman’s-educated scholar, has assembled a mighty tome here, a book to rival the 1970s Faber Book of Irish Verse edited by his old teacher at UCC, the poet John Montague. That anthology, with its historical texts and wide translations, created a new standard in this genre. Crotty has been faithful to the master, so that the present Penguin behemoth of 1,000 pages stretches the possibilities of the Irish poetic voice even further.