James Harpur
Born1956 (age 67–68)
Weybridge, Surrey, UK
OccupationPoet
Alma materTrinity College, Cambridge
Notable worksAngels and Harvesters; The White Silhouette; The Examined Life; The Pathless Country (novel)
Website
www.jamesharpur.com

James Harpur (born 1956) is a British-born Irish poet who has published eight books of poetry.[1] He has won a number of awards, including the Michael Hartnett Award and the UK National Poetry Competition.[2] He has also published books of non-fiction and a novel, The Pathless Country.[3] He lives in West Cork and is a member of Aosdána, the Irish academy of the arts.[2]

Biography

James Harpur was born in Britain in 1956 to an Irish father and a British mother and now lives near Clonakilty in County Cork. His father was born in Timahoe, County Laois, the son of a Church of Ireland minister, and his mother was born in Le Vésinet, Paris.[4] Harpur studied Classics and English at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he was a joint-winner of the Powell Prize for Poetry.[5] He taught English on the island of Crete and has subsequently worked as a lexicographer and freelance writer.

Works

Poetry

Many of the poems of his first collection, A Vision of Comets, take their inspiration from his time on Crete and from the Aegean area.[6] In 1995 he won the UK National Poetry Competition with a sonnet sequence, ‘The Frame of Furnace Light’, about the death of his father.[7] The poem was published in his second book, The Monk’s Dream. In 2000 Harpur became poet in residence in Exeter Cathedral, as part of the UK’s ‘Year of the Artist’ scheme.[8] In 2002 he moved to Ireland and settled in West Cork, near the town of Clonakilty.[4] His book, The Dark Age, featuring a sequence on Irish Dark Age saints, won the 2009 Michael Hartnett Award.[2] Further books include The White Silhouette (2018), described by the Irish Times as a ‘resonant, moving pilgrimage of great beauty’,[9] and The Examined Life (2021), described by Stephen Fry as a ‘quite marvellous work … an Odyssey, a Ulysses shaken up in the snow-dome of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.’[10]

Fiction

In 2021 Harpur published his first novel, The Pathless Country, winner of the J.G. Farrell Award and an Irish Writers’ Centre Novel Fair award. The story is set in early-1900s Ireland and London, and features a number of historical characters, including W.B. Yeats, Annie Besant, and J. Krishnamurti.[3]

Poetry style

According to the introduction to Harpur on the Poetry International website, he ‘is essentially an interior poet with a fascination for spirituality, and his poems are full of references to Christian as well as to other religious traditions. Stylistically, he has a deep sympathy with the mythopoeic strand of poetry, from Homer, Virgil and Dante to the Romantics and Yeats, Eliot and Ted Hughes. His non-literary influences include Carl Jung and J. Krishnamurti’.[11] In a review of The White Silhouette, Michael O’Neill wrote: ‘I have rarely encountered a contemporary voice that brings out as strongly and convincingly as does James Harpur’s in The White Silhouette the way in which spiritual wrestlings and traditions can live again in poetry.’[12]

Prizes and awards

Poetry

Fiction

(for The Pathless Country[3])

Bibliography

Poetry

  • The Oratory of Light, Wild Goose, 2021[17]
  • The Examined Life, Two Rivers Press, 2021[18]
  • The White Silhouette, Carcanet, 2018[19]
  • Angels and Harvesters, Anvil Press Poetry, 2012[20]
  • The Dark Age, Anvil Press Poetry, 2007[21]
  • Oracle Bones, Anvil Press Poetry, 2001[22]
  • The Monk’s Dream, Anvil Press Poetry, 1996[23]
  • A Vision of Comets, Anvil Press Poetry, 1993[24]

Translation

  • Fortune’s Prisoner: The poems of Boethius’s Consolation of Philosophy, Anvil Press Poetry, 2007[25]

Fiction

  • The Pathless Country, Cinnamon Press, 2021[26]

Spiritual books

  • The Pilgrim Journey (non-fiction), BlueBridge, 2015[27]
  • Love Burning in the Soul: the Story of the Christian Mystics (non-fiction), Shambhala, 2005[28]
  • The Gospel of Joseph of Arimathea (poetry and prose), Wild Goose, 2008[29]

Official website https://www.jamesharpur.com

Introduction to Harpur’s work on the Poetry International website: https://www.poetryinternational.com/en/poets-poems/poets/poet/102-12503_Harpur

Interview with Harpur by Poetry Ireland Review (via author’s website): https://www.jamesharpur.com/pirpiece.htm

Interview with Harpur by Kevin Brophy for Axon magazine (Australia): https://axonjournal.com.au/issues/8-2/james-harpur-process-20132017

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Author biog Versopolis".
  2. 1 2 3 "Author biog on Aosdána website".
  3. 1 2 3 "Publisher's website (Cinnamon Press)".
  4. 1 2 "An interview with James Harpur for Poetry Ireland Review 105, Winter, 2011/12".
  5. ↑ Poole, A; Leighton, A, eds. (2017). Trinity Poets. Carcanet. p. 321.
  6. ↑ "Author biog on Poetry International website".
  7. 1 2 "Poetry Society archive".
  8. ↑ "Oxford Brookes University Weekly Poems (notes from Anvil Press)".
  9. ↑ "Irish Times Books of 2018".
  10. ↑ "Two Rivers Press".
  11. ↑ "Patrick Cotter writing about Harpur on Poetry International website".
  12. ↑ "Michael O'Neill, 'Coloured Flares', London Magazine, 1 October 2018".
  13. ↑ "Vincent Buckley Poetry Prize, University of Melbourne".
  14. ↑ Looney, Patricia (ed.). Cork Words. Cork City Libraries. p. 16.
  15. ↑ "Limerick Post, 19 March 2009".
  16. ↑ "Eric Gregory Award, Society of Authors".
  17. ↑ The Oratory of Light. ISBN 9781849527903.
  18. ↑ The Examined Life. ISBN 9781909747876.
  19. ↑ The White Silhouette. ISBN 9781784105822.
  20. ↑ Angels and Harvesters. ISBN 9780856464478.
  21. ↑ The Dark Age. ISBN 9780856464041.
  22. ↑ Oracle Bones. ISBN 9780856463259.
  23. ↑ The Monk's Dream. ISBN 9780856462788.
  24. ↑ A Vision of Comets. ISBN 9780856462573.
  25. ↑ Fortune’s Prisoner: The poems of Boethius’s Consolation of Philosophy. ISBN 9780856464034.
  26. ↑ The Pathless Country. ISBN 9781911540113.
  27. ↑ The Pilgrim Journey. ISBN 9781629190006.
  28. ↑ Love Burning in the Soul. ISBN 9781590301128.
  29. ↑ The Gospel of Joseph of Arimathea. ISBN 9781905010356.
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