Death of a Naturalist

The 1966 prize-winning debut poetry collection from the Irish Nobel laureate, “the best Irish poet since W. B. Yeats” (Robert Lowell).

“His words give us the soil-reek of Ireland, the colourful violence of his childhood on a farm in Derry. The full-blooded energy of these poems makes Death of a Naturalist the best first book of poems I’ve read for some time.” —C.B. Cox in the Spectator

Death of a Naturalist marked the auspicious debut of Seamus Heaney, a universally acclaimed master of modern literature. As a first book of poems, it is remarkable for its accurate perceptions and rich linguistic gifts.

“The power and precision of his best poems are a delight, and as a first collection Death of a Naturalist is outstanding. . . . His subject is those things which are inherent or inherited. What he praises is to be praised in his own work.” —Christopher Ricks, New Statesman