Seamus Heaney

Seamus Heaney, one of the finest poets writing English language, and the late Richard Ellmann, biographer of Joyce and Wilde and critic of Yeats, in literary dialogue about these three brilliant Dublin writers. The dialogue uses documentary material pertaining to Joyce, Yeats, and Wilde, and was filmed at such literary landmarks as the Hill of Howth, Sandymount Green, Trinity College, and the Joyce Tower at Sandycove.

A portrait of one of the greatest English-language poets of his generation, this joyful and penetrating documentary was made with the late Seamus Heaney's unprecedented collaboration. The film explores the key personal relationship in his life, that with his wife Marie, and follows him to Harvard, New York and London, to readings, signings and public interviews. Offering compelling insights into the working life of a major writer, it digs deep into the rich store of Heaney's poetry to reveal a man who lived his life fully; used his gifts to give expression to the great themes in all our lives of love, loss and longing; and managed, as a man and as a writer, to combine the simplicity of a farmer's son from County Derry with the sophistication of a major artist.