'Richard Murphy's verse is classical in a way that demonstrates what the classical strengths really are. It combines a high music with simplicity, force and directness in dealing with the world of action. He has the gift of epic objectivity: behind his poems we feel not the assertion of his personality, but the actuality of events, the facts and sufferings of history.'
                                                                   — Ted Hughes

'. . . But no one who reads Murphy for the first time, and this book is a wonderful opportunity to do so, will come away without the satisfied feeling that they have read excellent poetry that is capable of weaving spells about them. Congratulations to Gallery for giving us this book.'
                                                                   — Fred Johnston, Books Ireland

'One of the truly great things about Richard Murphy's Collected Poems is just how alive the book is to the west of Ireland: its history and people, the landscape, customs and folkways of making a living (as Murphy did) from the sea. On this score the poems gathered in from Murphy's earlier books, such as Sailing to an Island (1963) and High Island (1974) have become classics in their own time.'
                                                                                                                       — Gerald Dawe, The Irish Times