Breakfast with Sylvia (Lagan Press, Belfast, 2005; US Edition 2007) Patrick Kavanagh Fellowship Award 2006 'Kevin Kiely, like quite a few of his literary contemporaries, has a reputation as strong in Europe and the US as it is here.' -James J. McAuley The Irish Times 2005 'Kiely jolts us into another dimension of language, where speech is worked like molten metal, throwing off sparks, allusions, memories and experiences. Yet through the pyrotechnics shines the cool winter light of Donegal.' -Barbara Ellis Iota (London) 2006 'Here poetry redeems itself in Kiely's assured perspective. The title poem is in two parts which, if they were music, must resonate of Bach.' -Tommy Frank O'Connor Studies Spring 2006 "Successful is his series about famous artistic personalities. The mix is eclectic: 'Requiem for Kurt Cobain' sits between 'Who's Afraid of Ezra Pound?' and 'Skimming Sam Beckett', while Ovid, Buddha, and Coleridge all inspire poems of their own." -Val Nolan Poetry Ireland Review 2006 'Lyrical, original, faithful to the moment and its joys but with an undertone of sometimes rueful experience-these are the poems of a man who has come through.' -Anthony Cronin 'These poems are full of edgily real things, people and places caught in a sudden urgent perspective that shakes the reader with their nearness. A poem such as 'On a deserted beach with a Sony Walkman'' succeeds in doing this simultaneously with the material world and with emotions and ideas about art. There is nothing glum or staid here and much that is invigorating to read.' -Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin 'The mythic mingles with the realistic, the spiritual touches the material world, the robust sexuality of many of the poems lies side by side with moments of delicate reticence. There's an energetic awareness of, and participation in the joy of being.' -Brendan Kennelly
About the Author: Kevin Kiely poet, novelist, literary critic, American Fulbright Scholar and PhD in modernist and postmodernist poetry from University College Dublin - was born in County Down, Northern Ireland. His commentaries on the arts and cultural issues appear in main stream media Village Magazine (Ireland), and the Irish Independent among other publications. Recent works include Breakfast with Sylvia (2006) (Lagan Press) which won the Patrick Kavanagh Fellowship in Poetry, A Horse Called El Dorado (2005) (O'Brien Press) Bisto Award Winner, The Welkinn Complex (2011) (Number One Son, Florida, FL) and SOS Lusitania 2012(O'Brien Press) which has been chosen as the 'One Book One Community' title for the Lusitania Centenary year in 2015. Francis Stuart: Artist and Outcast (Liffey Press, Dublin 2007; Dufour, PA 2008 Official Biography). Plays on RTÉ Children of No Importance and Multiple Indiscretions. Selected Anthology Listings for Poetry: Something Sensational To Read in the Train (anthology foreword: Brendan Kennelly) Lemon Soap Press, Dublin 2005; Catullus: One Man of Verona anthology ed. Ronan Sheehan Farmar & Farmar Ltd 2010; Ends & Beginnings anthology eds John Gery and William Pratt AMS Press Inc, New York 2011; A Map of Melancholy (long poem) in Windows Anthology eds. Heather Brett and Noel Monahan 2012; In Place of Love and Country eds Richard Parker & John Gery Crater Press, London 2013. wwwkevinkiely.net kevinkielypoet wiki