GERALD DAWE

The Proper Word
Collected Criticism—Ireland, Poetry, Politics
Gerald Dawe, Edited by Nicholas Allen
$25.00

“Gerald Dawe is an explorer, like Darwin and Humboldt, sailing way beyond the boundaries of his own Belfast identity in order to chart the minutiae and the ordinary design of far-flung terrain.” —Hugo Hamilton, author of Speckled People and The Harbor Boys

“Dawe is one of those critics no society can afford to be without . . . whose aims are essentially earthed in political decency and in the shaping power of imagination.”
—Sean Dunne, The Irish Times

“Gerald Dawe shows himself amicably opinionated, vigilant, resourceful and straightforward and can claim a good deal of affinity with Louis MacNeice’s ‘Individualist,’ escaping with his dog on the other side of the fair.”
—Patricia Craig, Times Literary Supplement

This collection of essays and reviews by one of Ireland’s leading poets and critics moves from assessments of the work of individual poets’ work to explorations of broader themes and topics in Irish cultural history.