Statement by President Michael D. Higgins on the death of Thomas Kinsella
Date: Wed 22nd Dec, 2021 | 20:28
“All those with a love of Irish poetry and culture will be saddened to have learned today of the death of Thomas Kinsella, one of Ireland’s finest poets. His reputation at home and abroad was one of being of a school that sought an excellence that did not know borders.
In addition to his rich contribution to the school syllabus for generations of students, where he once held a rare distinction as being a living poet on the syllabus, Thomas Kinsella’s work retained a fierce urgency and relevance for readers throughout life. Not least his work tackling the gap between the aspirations of what Irish society should be and that which he saw before him. That ethical pursuit was attempted through rigorously honed lines.
Thomas Kinsella, in addition to his own work, leaves a strong legacy in his translations from early Irish, most notably his collaboration with artist Louis le Brocquy on The Táin. That beautiful work came from a poet who valued and empathised with the Irish tradition.
I had the great pleasure in being present for one of Thomas’s last public engagements, when we visited his old primary school Model School Inchicore in 2019, a place like so many in his native Dublin 8 that he immortalised in his work. He remained to the end a truly remarkable man with a special grace that I recall from that occasion.
Sabina and I would like to offer our deepest sympathies to his family and Thomas Kinsella’s wide circle of friends at home and abroad.”