Translations
from the Irish of Brian Merriman (c.1745-1805)
and from the Metamorphoses of Ovid
Each
of the translations in this book can be read for its own sake
or as part of a triptych. By setting excerpts of Brian Merriman's
Cúirt an Mheán Oíche within the acoustic
of a classical myth (the story of Orpheus and Eurydice), Seamus
Heaney provides a new and illuminating context for the eighteenth
century Irish poem. For this paperback reissue, the poet has made
some revisions in the text of the original Gallery edition.