Spotlight on Paula Meehan

Paula Meehan was born in 1955 in Dublin where she still lives. While attending St. Michael’s Holy Faith Covent in Dublin she was expelled after organising a protest march against the school regime. She later studied at Trinity College, Dublin, and at Eastern Washington University in the USA, among other places of learning. She has since earned a widespread reputation as a poet, dramatist, performer, lyricist and lecturer.

She has published five collections of poetry, including Painting Rain(Carcanet, 2009). A selected volume, entitled Mysteries of the Home, was published in 1996. Her writing for stage includes the plays Mrs Sweeney(1997), Cell(1999), and, for children, Kirkle(1995), The Voyage(1997) and The Wolf of Winter(2003). Her poetry has been extensively published in translation, including French and German, and set to music by artists as diverse as avant-garde composer John Wolf Brennan and the folksinger Christy Moore.

Meehan has received several awards, including the Marten Toonder Award for Literature, The Butler Literary Award for Poetry, the Denis Devlin Memorial Award and the PPI Award for Radio Drama. In 2013, shewas installed as Ireland’s Professor of Poetry by President Michael D Higgins. The 2015 Competition, “A Poem for Ireland”, shortlisted her 1991 poem ‘The Statue of the Virgin at Granard Speaks’ in the final ten poems.

She has also collaborated with dancers, visual artists and film makers. Paula Meehan is a member of Aosdána.