By Jessica Traynor

Liffey Swim

Debut collection of poems by Dubliner Jessica Traynor, much of it set in her native city.

Description

Liffey Swim is the debut collection of poems from Dubliner Jessica Traynor, in which family portraits and local history combine with mythological musings to create a strikingly assured and engaging suite of poems. Delivered in a language that is at once fresh and confident, these poems have already earned her a number of awards and honours and marked her out as a distinctive new talent in Irish writing.

“Her finely lyrical work is informed by wide travel, a meditative intelligence and an acute sense of history, in which Dublin and its three rivers become a living metaphor for the truths and felicities of one woman’s life.” — Harry Clifton

‘Fresh, erudite and engaging.’ – Cordite

Hear Jessica Traynor interviewed by Sean Rocks and reading from Liffey Swim, on Arena (RTÉ Radio 1) here.

A small selection of poems translated into Italian by Chiara De Luca here.


ISBN 978 1 906614 97 3 Paperback
140 x 216 mm, 76 pp
Sept. 2014

Product Detail

  • ISBN: : 9781906614973
  • Size: : 216 x 140 mm
  • Pages: : 76 pp
  • Published: : September 2014

About The Author

Author

JESSICA TRAYNOR was born in Dublin in 1984. She is poet, dramaturg and creative writing teacher. Her debut collection, Liffey Swim (Dedalus Press, 2014), was shortlisted for the Strong/Shine Award and was named one of the best poetry debuts of the past five years on Bustle.com. It has recently been published in Brazil. Her second collection, The Quick, was an Irish Times poetry choice of 2019. In 2019, she co-edited Correspondences: an anthology to call for an end to direct provision with actor Stephen Rea. The book was a best-seller, with all proceeds going to MASI (Movement of Asylum Seekers in Ireland). Recent commissions include Music for Galway/ Galway 2020, The Yeats Society Sligo, The Model, VISUAL Carlow, Dun-Laoghaire Rathdown County Council, The Arts Council, BBC Radio 4, The Arts Council, Irish National Opera, RTÉ’s Poetry Programme, Sunday Miscellany and The Salvage Press. Awards include the Ireland Chair of Poetry Bursary, Hennessy New Irish Writer of the Year and the Listowel Poetry Prize. She was the recipient of a Dublin City Council Literature Bursary and in 2009, was chosen for the Poetry Ireland Introduction Series. In 2016, she was named one of Poetry Ireland’s ‘Rising Generation’ of poets. Residencies include the 2020 Writer in Residence in Carlow College and 2020 Poet in Residence at the Yeats Society Sligo. She is an inaugural Creative Fellow of UCD, where she completed her MA in Creative Writing in 2008.