Kevin Kiely (poet)

Early life

Kiely was born on 2 June 1953 in Warrenpoint, County Down, Northern Ireland. His grandfather's brother was the Olympian John Jesus Flanagan, inventor of the hammer for Slazenger America as used in the Olympic Games, and three-time record-breaking gold medallist. Kiely's childhood was spent in many parts of Ireland due to his father's work with the Munster & Leinster Bank. Aged 7, he was sent to Wimbledon, London to his aunt. In 1963 on the death of his father, John Francis Kiely, he was sent by his guardian and uncle, Edward Vaughan-Neil, to Mt St. Joseph's Abbey, Roscrea where he was a boarder from 1966–1969. He completed his education in Blackrock College, Dublin, from 1969–1971.

Wandering, work, academic life

He became a field study technician for Smedley HP in Cambridgeshire 1973–1975 and wandered in Europe working part-time at various jobs while reading in the national libraries of many countries, but otherwise mainly residing in Paris and London. Kiely attended University College Galway in 1976, participating on the Art Council-funded National Writers Workshop, and was made an honorary fellow of Iowa University in 1983. He holds a Masters in Literature from Trinity College in 2005 and a PhD from University College Dublin in 2009. His doctoral thesis on John L. Sweeney: Patron of Poetry at Harvard's Woodberry Poetry Room gained him an American Fulbright Award in 2007, enabling years of full-time lecturing at American universities including Boise State University and University of Idaho-Moscow, and research at Harvard.

Writings

Kiely co-edited The Belle, a counter-cultural magazine with Maurice Scully from 1978–1979. He moved from Dublin to Spain where he taught at Colegio Xaloc and gave public lectures on poetry and literature.

Quintesse, published in 1982 in Dublin by Co-Op Books, found a New York publisher in 1985. During this period he was invited to the University of Iowa on the International Writing Programme Fellowship working with the American poet Paul Engel as well as poets Gary Snyder, Marvin Bell and Jorie Graham. Mere Mortals, an experimental pastiche of the post-Joycean novel, was published in 1989 in Dublin.

With the publication of the biography of Francis Stuart, a Nazi sympathizer and collaborator, Kiely wandered into controversy. The book titled Francis Stuart: Artist and Outcast came out in Ireland and America, and Kiely's stance was seen by some as "diplomatic" or even as an attempt to partly whitewash Stuart, whereas some others suggested that Kiely was "not writing the book that more opinionated readers, eager to prove Stuart's lapses, would have demanded."

Kiely's poetry such as the collection Breakfast with Sylvia, published in 2005 was highly praised in America and Ireland by leading poets. ‘Kiely has a reputation as strong in Europe and the US as it is here'.

Besides book publication and work in anthologies his poetry has appeared in The Edinburgh Review, Poetry Ireland Review, Adrift (New York), Foolscap (London), Oasis (London), Acumen (UK), Other Poetry (UK), Cyphers, The Literary Review (New Jersey), Chapman (Scotland), Southword, Cork Literary Review, The Black Mountain Review, The Shop, Fortnight, Storm (Scotland), Touchstone (UK), Stony Thursday Book, Idaho Arts Quarterly, The Journal: Cumbria (UK), Decanto (UK), The Poetry Bus, The Sunday Independent, and Revival Literary Journal.

Kiely's plays, Multiple Indiscretions (1997) and Children of No Importance (2000), have been produced by RTÉ. He is also a successful novelist for young readers. A Horse Called El Dorado won the CBI Bisto Award in 2006. SOS Lusitania (2013) is a novel about war, politics and conspiracy theory. His most recent adult fiction is The Welkinn Complex, which exposes psychiatric practice and the pharmaceutical industry.

Kiely received Arts Council Literature Bursary Awards for his writings in 1980, 1989, 1990, 1998, 1999, and 2004.

Criticism

Kiely had begun reviewing poetry and literature, first with John Mulcahy's Hibernia, and later for various publications including The Examiner and Books Ireland. He became New Writing Editor and later Literary Editor (2000–2005) on Books Ireland at the invitation of its founder, Jeremy Cecil Addis, in 1995. He writes extensive and controversial criticism in Hibernia, Irish Examiner, The Democrat Arts Page, Irish Studies Review, Honest Ulsterman, Fortnight, Books Ireland, The London Magazine, The Irish Book Review, Poetry Ireland Review, Irish Times, Irish Arts Review, Irish Literary Review, and Idaho Arts Quarterly.

Kiely's poetry criticism is not just confined to homegrown Irish publishing which he has extensively commented on in many reviews and surveys. He questioned the pervasively state-funded poetry scene amidst the arts in general "amidst cliques and cabals", and made public the lack of accountability of many arts institutions. He launched vociferous and persistent criticism of institutions such as Aosdána, which he feels are anathema to the identity and autonomy of the serious artist. His statements about the Arts Council's Aosdána reflect the wider concern along with other artists such as Robert Ballagh in relation to public funding channels devoid of accountability.

His another statement reached national news when he reviewed President Michael D. Higgins' Selected Poems in 2012 calling his poems "‘crime against literature'". Irish poet Paul Durcan, quoted by The Irish Central, defended Michael D. Higgins, who, in his view, "has an absolute commitment to the spirit of poetry." Durcan also said that "Kiely had no competence to talk or write about poetry at any level. All of us in the poetic community know that. Since the 1980s he has been writing rubbish about poetry.”

Interviews

Published works