“An Otter’s Temporary Resting Place”: Michael Longley’s Western Landscape

ABSTRACTThis article discusses the western landscape in Michael Longley’s poems, a physical, imaginary, and aesthetic space that displays some of the most sustained tensions between self and other, the ecological and the political in his work. Drawing on Timothy Morton’s ideas such as intimate strangeness, interconnectedness, and difference, this article argues that the sense of interconnectedness in Longley’s poems values an ecological interdependency that emphasizes defamiliarization, instability, strangeness, and difference. It informs a philosophy of co-existence that stands against fixed dwelling and rigid identity categorisation both within and beyond the Northern Ireland situation.KEYWORDS: Michael LongleyThe Irish Westecocritical readingContemporary Irish Poetry Disclosure StatementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Notes1 Brearton, Reading Michael Longley, 12.2 Reynolds, “Some Perspectives after Pope”, 219.3 Brown, “Place and Placelessness”, 143.4 Brearton, “The Privilege/ Of vertigo”, 199.5 Heaney, “Place and Displacement”, 173.6 McDonald, Mistaken Identity, 118.7 Kennedy-Andrews, Writing Home, 153.8 Foster, “Challenges to an Irish Eco-Criticism”, 7.9 Longley, “Japanese Influences”, 21.10 McElroy, “Northern Ireland-Global South”, 155; Peacock, qtd in Alexander “Shorelines”, 75.11 Herron, “Mayo Littoral”, 80.12 See James McElroy’s chapter “Northern Ireland—Global South” in Ecocriticism of the Global South (2015): “Rajeev Patke, ‘Partition and its Aftermath: Poetry and History in Northern Ireland’ (2010), writes that Northern Ireland’s poets try ‘to marginalize the politics of partition by practicing a poetics of obliquity’ (24). This is especially true of poets who hail from the North’s Protestant tradition” (156).13 Redmond, “Fighting for Balance”, 259.14 Brearton, Reading Michael Longley, 249.15 Russell, Poetry and Peace, 166.16 Michael Longley, “The West”, CP, 69.17 Morton, The Ecological Thought, 7.18 Ibid., 8.19 Morton, “Thinking Ecology”, 281.20 Ibid., 47, 54.21 Morton, “Unworking Animals”, 77.22 Timothy Morton sees the capitalized word “Nature” as inadequate for thinking about ecology. He argues that “ecology can do without a concept of something, a thing of some kind, ‘over yonder,’ called Nature. Yet thinking, including ecological thinking, has set up ‘Nature’ as a reified thing in the distance, under the sidewalk, on the other side where the grass is always greener … ” (The Ecological Thought, 3).23 Morton, The Ecological Thought, 5.24 Welch, “Michael Longley and the West”, 55.25 Morton, The Ecological Thought, 15.26 Longley, CP, 35.27 Morton, “Why Ambient Poetics”, 55.28 Lysaght, qtd in Longley Selected Prose, 344.29 Morton, The Ecological Thought, 47.30 Nash, “Remapping and Renaming”, 44.31 Foster, “The Western Island”, 264.32 Herron, “Mayo Littoral”, 75.33 Deane, Nationalism, Colonialism, and Literature, 11.34 Michael Longley, Sidelines, 343; Edna Longley, The Living Stream, 23.35 Kiberd, “Contemporary Irish Poetry”, 1315.36 Mahon, Collected Poems, 47.37 Peacock, qtd in Alexander “Shorelines”, 75.38 Kiberd, “Contemporary Irish Poetry”, 1375.39 Longley, Selected Prose, 343–44.40 Ibid., 343.41 Ibid., 113.42 Alexander, “Shorelines”, 73.43 Kennedy-Andrews, Writing Home, 138.44 Morton, The Ecological Thought, 50.45 Ibid.46 Welch, “Michael Longley and the West”, 60.47 Selected Prose, 342.48 “In Mayo”, CP, 89.49 Brearton, 117.50 Heaney, “Natural Perceptions”, 174.51 Brearton, 44.52 “Leaving Inishmore”, CP, 35.53 Longley, qtd in Heaney 37.54 Mistaken Identity, 127.55 Selected Prose, 337.56 Kennedy-Andrews, “Conflict, Violence”, 74–5; “the fundamental interconnectedness of all things/ is incredible enough … ”. The line is taken from Longley’s poem “According to Pythagoras”, which is collected in The Ghost Orchid (1995).57 Kennedy-Andrews, “Conflict, Violence”, 74, 83.58 Morton, The Ecological Thought, 40, 46; “Unworking Animals”, 77.59 “Remembering Carrigskeewaun”, CP, 170.60 “Birthday Party”, The Candlelight Master, 68.61 Longley, “An Interview with Margaret Mills Harper”.62 Mistaken Identities, 128.63 Warman, “Precision and Suggestion”, 48.64 Mistaken Identities, 47–8.65 See Selected Prose, 349.66 Ibid.67 Longley, qtd, in Ling 59.68 Brown, “Place and Placelessness”, 143.69 Michalski, “Michael Longley and Birds”, 82.70 See Selected Prose, 348.71 Herron, “Mayo Littoral”, 80.72 Morton, 15.73 Morton, The Ecological Thought, 47.74 Ibid., 4.75 Morton, “Unworking Animals”, 77; The Ecological Thought, 41.76 Longley, “Interview with Jody Allen-Randolph”, 85.77 Kennedy-Andrews, “Conflict, Violence”, 76.78 Ibid., 81.79 Longley, The Living Stream, 194.80 Longley, “A Poet at Work”.81 “Skylarks”, The Slain Birds, 19.82 Kiberd, “Contemporary Irish Poetry”, 1315.83 Viney, “Another Life”.84 O’Loughlin, “One Wide Expanse Review”.85 Mistaken Identity, 114.86 “Home”, The Slain Birds, 16.87 Morton, The Ecological Thought, 55.88 Kennedy-Andrews, “Conflict, Violence”, 75.89 Longley, “Interview with Jody Allen-Randolph”, 88.90 O’ Hare, “Review”, 143.91 See Selected Prose, 356.92 Solnick, Poetry and the Anthropocene, 32.