The title poem from this collection is set on an island that has been a site of pilgrimage in Ireland for over a thousand years. A narrative sequence, it is an autobiographical quest concerned with'the growth of a poet's mind'. The long poem is preceded by a section of shorter lyrics and leads into a third group of poems in which the poet's voice is at one with the voice of the legendary mad King Sweeney.'Surpasses even what one might reasonably expect from this magnificently gifted poet.' John Carey, Sunday Times

Seamus Heaney was born in County Derry in Northern Ireland.Death of a Naturalist, his first collection of poems, appeared in 1966 and since then he has published poetry, criticism and translations - includingBeowulf (1999) - which have established him as one of the leading poets now at work. In 1995 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.District and Circle (2006) was awarded the T. S. Eliot Prize in 2006.Stepping Stones, a book of interviews conducted by Dennis O'Driscoll, appeared in 2008. In 2009 he received the David Cohen Prize for Literature.