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Vona Groake, Irish essayist and poet, will share the 2003 Charles A. Heimbold Endowed Chair in Irish Studies with her fellow poet Conor O’Callaghan. This is the first time two scholars have shared the chair and these two happen to be husband and wife. Appropriately, they will team-teach two English/Honors courses. One is titled “Inside Out and Outside In” and the other is an advanced creative writing course

The former will look at several poets whose work has been engaged with the challenges, disappointments and rewards of exile, either from or in Ireland. “Inside Out,” led by Groak, will examine poets such as Oliver Goldsmith, Louis MacNeice, Derek Mahon and Eavan Boland and consider how the experience of exile has informed their poetry. The course will also cover recent poets, including Seamus Heaney, Eamon Grennan, Paul Muldoon, Thomas Kinsella, Sinead Morrissey, and Justin Quinn. American and British poets who have written about their exiled parents and their heritage will be examined as well.

The “Outside In” component of the course will consider the work of non-Irish poets who have lived for substantial periods within Ireland and will be led by O’Callaghan. Among the poets whose work will be covered are Gerard Manley Hopkins, Philip Larkin and John Berryman. The course will also survey foreign poets who have written about Ireland from afar or from first-hand experience: Wallace Stevens, Theodore Roethke, Joseph Brodsky, Craig Raine, Carol Rumens, Jean Valentine, Tess Gallagher and others.

The advanced creative writing course will be team-facilitated and will be open to writers of poetry and short fiction. The format will involve a discussion of technique with reference to the work of outstanding contemporary writers. Then participants will read their own works-in-progress for critical feedback from both moderators and from fellow students. The aim of the course is to be an informal workshop that gives aspiring writers an environment that is supportive, practical and fun.

Vona Groake received her bachelor’s degree in 1986 from Trinity College Dublin and a postgraduate diploma in 1993 from University College Cork. She has published three collections of poetry: Flight (2003), Other People’s Houses (1993), and Shale (1994), all published by Gallery Press, Dublin. She is also a well known essayist and reviewer
O’Callaghan, who received a master’s degree in creative writing from Trinity College in 1998, also has published several collections of poetry, including Seatown and Earlier Poems (Wake Forest University Press, 2000), Seatown (Gallery Press, 1999), The History of Rain (Gallery Press, 1993), and A History of Hello (Phoenix Press, 2003). He has contributed poetry, essays and criticism to The Times Literary Supplement, Metre, Poetry Ireland Review, Thumbscrew, The Irish Times and other publications.

The Charles A. Heimbold Endowed Chair in Irish Studies was inaugurated in 2000 and since then has hosted several of Ireland’s leading literary lights, among poets Peter Fallon (2000) Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill (2001) and Eamon Grennan (2002). Last year, playwright Marina Carr held the chair.