Julie O’Callaghan

Life
1954- ; b. Chicago, descendant or great-grandparents from Ballyjamesduff, Co. Cavan and dg. of High School teacher in Chicago; moved to Ireland, 1974 and stayed on; worked in TCD Library; issued Edible Anecdotes (1983), Poetry Books Soc. Recommendation; also What’s What (1992), Poetry Book Choice; also No Can Do (2000), while Taking My Pen for a Walk (1988) and Two Barks (1999) are poetry collections for teenagers; winner of Michael Hartnett Poetry Award, 2001; Arts Council Bursaries in 1985, 1990, and 1998; elected to Aosdána, May 2003; issued Problems (2005) and Tell Me This is Normal: New and Selected Poems (2007), Poetry Book Recommendation; mbr. of Aosdana; suffered the loss of her husband Dennis O’Driscoll [q.v.], Dec. 2012; recently issued Magnum Mysterium (Bloodaxe Books 2020) - on the untimely death of her husband.

Works
Tell Me This is Normal: New and Selected Poems (Newcastle-upon-Tyne :Bloodaxe 2007), 168pp. [Poetry Book Recomm.] A poem, “A View of Mount Fuji” ded. Patrick Scott (Irish Times, 15 June 1996, Wk., p.10).

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Quotations
‘Poems Have to Sneak up on You’, in “My Writing Day” [column], Irish Times (11 March 2000), Weekend, p.9, by author of No Can Do (Bloodaxe.). O’Callaghan writes:‘[…] The most important attribute needed for poetry is a sens eof how odd it is to be a humanoid. If you don’t wake up every morning on a foreign planet, you can forget poetry as a pastime. You make take all the writing courses you want, but the essential ingredient cannot be taught.’

References
Anthologised in New Oxford Book of Children’s Verse (OUP q.d.) and New Faber Book of Children's Verse (Faber. q.d.); Bright Lights Blaze Out (OUP 1986); Cambridge Contemporary Poets, 1 (Cambridge UP 1992).

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