Doubly Blessed ! The Irish Independent has a review by Hugh McFadden of a greatly improved “Collected Works” of Patrick Kavanagh. And on BBC2 NI at 6:10 PM this Sunday a chance to see Seamus Heaney (1978 model) talk about the great man and his life in County Monaghan.Apparently the 1964 Kavanagh Collection, edited by John Montague, was limited in it’s scope because he didn’t have access to a number of important poems , including “Lough Derg”. A long-standing Court battle between the poet’s Brother and the estate of the poet’s late wife has been settled in court.
The BBC trailer for “Where Genesis Begins” is promising. Heaney talks of the rural life and piety of Kavanagh’s upbringing. It will be interesting to see how this film of the 1970’s, when Ireland was coming to terms with revisionism, treats the reality that Kavanagh hated everything to do with the de Valeran rural dream.