Where Love and Imagination Colour the Dark: Essays on Thomas Kinsella

Where Love and Imagination Colour the Dark establishes a broad interdisciplinary context in which to consider the work of Thomas Kinsella, one of the most significant poets in modern Irish and international poetry. This collection of twelve essays by some of the finest poets and scholars of contemporary Irish poetry provides a detailed reading of the themes and forms throughout Kinsella's remarkable career. Beginning with several chapters devoted to assessing the aesthetic importance of Kinsella's native Dublin, this volume traces the evolution of the poet's work from the early formalism of the 1950s through the Jungian-inspired explorations of the psyche, his fascination with personal origins and Irish mythology, and the open-ended sequences that characterized his mature poetry. The central role of Kinsella's Peppercanister Press from both a creative and artistic perspective is also explored, as is the fundamental importance of Kinsella's wife Eleanor, his partner and Muse for more than sixty years.