Derry O'Sullivan is an Irish poet living in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

, France. He was born in 1944 in

Bantry Bantry () is a town in the civil parish of Kilmocomoge in the barony of Bantry on the southwest coast of County Cork, Ireland. It lies in West Cork at the head of Bantry Bay, a deep-water gulf extending for to the west. The Beara Peninsula i ...

, County Cork, Ireland. His poetry collections in the

Irish language Irish (Standard Irish: ), also known as Irish Gaelic or simply Gaelic ( ), is a Celtic language of the Indo-European language family. It is a member of the Goidelic languages of the Insular Celtic sub branch of the family and is indigenous ...

are: "Cá bhfuil do Iudás?" (Dublin,

Coiscéim Coiscéim (; "Footstep") is a prolific Dublin-based Irish-language publisher founded by writer, historian and language activist Pádraig Ó Snodaigh in 1980. With over 1,500 titles Coiscéim have published the largest number of titles amongst the ...

, 1987) - winner of fou
Oireachtas
Literary prizes and the

Seán Ó Ríordáin Seán Pádraig Ó Ríordáin (3 December 1916 – 21 February 1977), sometimes referred to as an Ríordánach, was an Irish language poet and later a newspaper columnist. He is credited with introducing European themes to Irish poetry, and is wi ...

Memorial Prize; "Cá bhfuil Tiarna Talún l’Univers?" (Dublin, Coiscéim, 1994); "An Lá go dTáinig Siad" (Dublin, Coiscéim, 2005), a long poem about the Nazi occupation of Paris, and "An bhfuil cead agam dul amach, más é do thoil é?" (Dublin, Coiscéim, 2009). He has participated in literary festivals in Ireland, France, the US and Canada and his work has been published in numerous literary reviews and anthologies.

Life and work

O'Sullivan's poems have been translated into English and French and several of them can be consulted in

Harvard University Library Harvard Library is the network of libraries and services at Harvard University, a private Ivy League university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Harvard Library is the oldest library system in the United States and both the largest academic librar ...

. His work appears in English translation in "The King’s English" (Paris, First Impressions, 1987). "En Mal de Fleurs" (Québec
Lèvres Urbaines 30
1988) is a suite of poems written directly in French. An English translation b
Kaarina Hollo
of O'Sullivan's poe

won the 201

, a competition open to poems in all languages and from all periods of history. O'Sullivan's poem ‘Blip’ was incorporated into the fabric of the Gaelscoil (Irish-medium primary school) in Bantry, County Cork, as part of a public art project in 2014, in collaboration with the artists Cleary&Connoll

O'Sullivan made the first direct translation of the 10th-Century Irish poem "Cailleach Béara" ("The Lament of the Old Woman of Beare") into French, in collaboration with Jean-Yves Bériou and Martine Joulia, as "Lamentations de la vieille femme de Beare", published in a hand-printed Irish/French bilingual edition (Paris, 1992, 1995) and revised in 2006 ( Éditions de l'Escampette). A former priest, O'Sullivan is married and has three children. He has taught English at the Sorbonne (University of Paris), the

Institut Catholique de Paris The Institut catholique de Paris (, abbr. ICP), known in English as the Catholic University of Paris (and in Latin as ''Universitas catholica Parisiensis''), is a private university located in Paris, France. History: 1875–present The Institut ...

(The Catholic University of Paris) and the

Institut Supérieur d’Electronique de Paris An institute is an organizational body created for a certain purpose. They are often research organisations (research institutes) created to do research on specific topics, or can also be a professional body. In some countries, institutes ca ...

. He is a senior examiner for the

International Baccalaureate The International Baccalaureate Organization (IBO), more commonly known as the International Baccalaureate (IB), is a nonprofit foundation headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, and founded in 1968. It offers four educational programmes: the I ...

. Among other projects he co-founded the Festival Franco-Anglais de Poésie. The late Reginald Gray, O'Sullivan's friend, provided the cover art of three of his poetry collections, as well the portrait on the right. Other collaborations with visual artists include "Ceamara/Camera", a bilingual Irish/English poem, reply to

Jean-Max Albert Jean-Max Albert (born 1942) is a French painter, sculptor, writer, and musician. He has published theory, books on artists, and a collection of poems, plays and novels inspired by quantum physics. He perpetuated experiments initiated by Paul Klee ...

’s french poem ‘’La camera sans film’’, in a hand-printed, limited-edition art book by Kate Van Houten
Estepa Editions
Paris 2010) and "Saorganach/En affranchi à faux", a bilingual French/Irish poem illustrated b
Valerie Vahey
in a hand-printed, limited-edition boxed set
"Poésie et Gravure" (Ateliers Bo Halbirk, 2012)
O’Sullivan was commissioned by the PayneShurvell gallery to write an interpretation of Rudolf Reiber'
Suspiria
(2012) as part of the first solo exhibition in London of the German artist. He has also collaborated (in Latin) with the Mexican artis

References

"The Cambridge History of Irish Literature", Volume 2
page 349. published 2006: "A shortlist of the most notable among the (re)emergent voices (in contemporary Irish language poetry) might include... Derry O'Sullivan. O'Sullivan's technical ingenuity and agitated intelligence are such that they constantly threaten to outrun his linguistic ability; his elegy for a stillborn child, 'Marbhghin: Glaoch ar Liombo', is one of the most achingly beautiful Irish poems of the twentieth century." *

Poetry Ireland Review ''Poetry Ireland Review'' is a journal of Irish poetry published three times a year by Poetry Ireland, the national Irish poetry organisation. ''Poetry Ireland Review'' publishes the work of both emerging and established Irish and internation ...

, Number 102: "O'Sullivan's language has tremendous range and one would suspect that if Irish were to become a language of Paris it might be spoken as O'Sullivan writes it."

External links

Profile of Derry O'Sullivan
by Conor Power in

The Sunday Times ''The Sunday Times'' is a British Sunday newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of N ...

, 2 December 2012
Derry O'Sullivan at Irish Writers Online

Derry O'Sullivan at the National Library of Ireland

* . * {{DEFAULTSORT:Osullivan, Derry 1944 births Irish poets Living people Academic staff of the University of Paris People from Bantry