Eavan Boland, one of Ireland’s leading modern poets, critics and translators will read and discuss her writings and wider work on Thursday 4 October as part of Glasgow's popular series of visiting writer events.

Boland, whose work is taught in schools and universities throughout Britain and America and is featured in all major anthologies, came to prominence with her third major collection of poetry, The Journey. Several of her books have been Poetry Book Society Selections and her Collected Poems was published two years ago. She has been shortlisted for the 2007 Forward Prize, Britain's most generous poetry award, for her most recent book, Domestic Violence.

Boland is also convenor of the celebrated creative writing programme at Stanford University, California.

Professor Michael Schmidt, Convener of the University of Glasgow's Creative Writing programme, said: "Of her critical books, the most popular is Object Lessons, an exploration of what it means to be a woman and a writer in the modern world, in particular the modern world of Ireland . Boland explores how women can make a space for their experience in what has hitherto been a world dominated by other interests. She famously remarked that when she began  writing one could have a political murder in a poem but not a baby. Her poetry and her subtle, nurturing prose have helped to change the Irish poetic environment."

Describing Boland’s new book in the Irish Times, Fiona Sampson, editor of Poetry Review, said: "Forty years after her first book, New Territory, was published, Eavan Boland's work continues to deepen in both humanity and complexity. This is the more remarkable since her highly-articulated ars poetica has already remapped the territory of contemporary poetry. But Domestic Violence does just what the title implies; breaking apart the certainties of those very domestic interiors which Boland has famously made her own."

This major event is free and takes place in the Wolfson Lecture Theatre, Wolfson Medical Building, University of Glasgow from 5:30 – 7:30pm on 4 October. All are welcome to attend.

The Creative Writing Programme of the School of English and Scottish Language and Literature at the University of Glasgow hosts this event as part its ongoing series of public lectures and readings by leading writers of our time.

Notes for editors

For more information please contact Kate Richardson in the University of Glasgow's Media Relations Office on 0141 330 3683 or email k.richardson@admin.gla.ac.uk

First published: 2 October 2007

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