Northern Ireland has become once more, to borrow a lyric from Van Morrison, the place where poetic champions compose.
Not since the late Sixties, when Seamus Heaney and Derek Mahon burst on to the international literary scene, have Northern Ireland's poets been lauded with such global praise.
Almost all the major poetry prizes in 2007, along with appointments to university chairs, have been won by poets from the north. They include not only poetic giants such as Heaney or Michael Longley, but relatively new writers such as Belfast lecturer Sinead Morrissey.
Morrissey won this year's international Lannan Prize, which is worth $75,000 (about £36,500). One of her compatriots, Alan Gillis, has been shortlisted for the 2008 TS Eliot Prize, won this year by Heaney.
The UK's poet laureate, Andrew Motion, said it was no coincidence that Northern Ireland's poets were receiving so many accolades around the world. Motion said the influence of such established poets as Heaney and Longley was invaluable for the new generation of Northern Irish writers now emerging.
'Instead of lying under their canopy basking in glory, the likes of Seamus and Michael have been working hard to nurture new talent. These are exciting new times in which a fresh generation is being helped to find its voice,' Motion said.
Maureen Boyle, one of the emerging poets, praised the work of the Queen's University Writers' Group and the Seamus Heaney Centre in Belfast for encouraging new writers.
Boyle, winner of the Strokestown and the Ireland Chair of Poetry Prize, said she believed the poetry reconnaissance was in part due to writers feeling less isolated. 'The business of writing is a strange, lonely thing at times so it's been great to have somewhere like Heaney Centre to meet with others,' she said.
Victors in verse
Derek Mahon: the David Cohen prize.
Seamus Heaney: the TS Eliot award.
Matt Kirkham: the Rupert and Eithne Strong prize.
Maureen Boyle: the Strokestown and the Ireland Chair of Poetry Prize.
Sinead Morrissey: the Lannan prize worth $75,000.
Miriam Gamble: the Eric Gregory award.
