Books
Posted on June 10th, 2008 by Katie
Her poetry collections are “Watermelon Man” (Newcastle Upon Tyne, Bloodaxe Books, 1993); “Entering the Mare” (Bloodaxe Books, 1997); and “Day of the Dead” (Tarset, UK, Bloodaxe Books, 2002).
She is the author of a pamphlet, “Irish Women Writers: Marginalised by Whom?” (Dublin, Raven Arts Press, 1988; 1991). With Brendan Kennelly and A.Norman Jeffares she edited “Ireland’s Women, Writings Past and Present” (Dublin, Gill & MacMillan/1994; UK, Kyle Cathie 1994/ New York, Norton & Norton, 1996). She is the co-editor, with Brendan Kennelly, of “Dublines” (Bloodaxe Books, 1995), an anthology of writings about Dublin.
Poetry Collections
Day of the Dead
“Donovan has an exceptional descriptive gift….a highly idiosyncratic, individualistic writer who probes experiences for hidden meanings…her seeming introversion is expressed through a poetry of great solidity and tactility… She covers a remarkable range in ‘Day of the Dead’, extending from the powerful elegies and international death-rituals of the opening poems to smart human parables.” Bernard O’Donoghue, “The Irish Times”
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£7.95 Paperback
1 85224 592 1. 80pp. 2002.
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Entering the Mare
“Disarming candour, detachment, intense emotion, and violent, savage imagery..Thoughtful and precise, Donovan’s tough, compassionate, practical intelligence is tempered by humour, grace and a pleasure in playfulness.” Eileen Battersby, “The Irish Times”
“This is a superb volume, which should be considered a defining moment, in restoring the female voice to its rightful place in the Irish cultural realm.” Niall McGrath, “The Honest Ulsterman”
£6.95 Paperback
1 85224 429 1. 64pp. 1997.
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Watermelon Man
“Here is a poet who enjoys writing about what is new and strange, surprising or disconcerting… When she is introspective, what she homes in on is not the reflective mind’s attempt at a just balance but the wildness of the instant of emotion.”
Eilean Ni Chuilleanain, “Cyphers”
“Adventures of place meet and mingle with adventures of the body. This is by no means a reliable or frequent encounter in contemporary poetry… The tension in these poems is also their intent: they are discovering and making a private world which also manages, with real grace, to be inclusive and engaging.”
Eavan Boland
£6.95 Paperback
1 85224 215 9. 64pp. 1993.
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Launch June 1st 7pm Damer Hall, Stephen’s Green, Dublin
Rootling: New & Selected Poems
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This book draws on three previous collections, together with a whole collection of new poems, Rootling. Here Katie Donovan’s lively sensibility explores motherhood, with the birth of her two children: from the blues to the pleasures of breastfeeding, she charts the shock of birth and the delights of watching her babies develop. Enmeshed in the familial and domestic, the death of her father prompts her to shuttle back to scenes of her own rural childhood, as well as mourning the passing of a remarkable man. The end of the collection dwells on her partner’s courageous struggle with cancer.
for full description, see Bloodaxe Books
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Essays
Irish Women Writers: Marginalised by Whom? (Letters from the New Island)
39 pages
Raven Arts Pr (1988)
As Editor
Ireland’s Women: Writings Past and Present
edited by Katie Donovan, A. Norman Jeffares, Brendan Kennelly
Paperback: 552 pages
Gill & Macmillan Ltd (30 April 1994)
* ISBN-10: 0717122026
* ISBN-13: 978-0717122028
Dublines
Edited by Brendan Kennelly and Katie Donovan
A portrait of Dublin through the ages by its novelists, poets, talkers, historians, anecdotalists and chron-iclers of all kinds, writing on the city’s poverty, opulence, gossip, revolutions, renewals everything.
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£10.95 Paperback
1 85224 257 4. 320pp. 1996.
£25.00 cloth
1 85224 256 6. 320pp. 1996.
Subjects: Irish Poets, Love Poetry, Mythology Interest, Poets of the 1980/90s, Women