Tributes paid after death of poet James Liddy, aged 73

TRIBUTES HAVE been paid to the poet James Liddy, who died at his home in the United States on Tuesday after a short illness.

Born in Dublin in 1934, Liddy is perhaps best known for his early collections, In A Blue Smoke(1964) and Blue Mountain(1968). The first volume of his memoir, The Doctor's House: An Autobiography, was published in 2004.

The director of the Arts Council, Mary Cloake, said Liddy was one of the most independent, engaging and original poets of his time. "His poetry, which revealed a consistent intellectual and emotional curiosity, was widely read in Ireland and abroad," she said.

The poet and Trinity-based academic Gerard Dawe described Liddy as a cosmopolitan man who provided a valuable link between the "Patrick Kavanagh generation" and a younger group of poets coming to prominence in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

"Those who were close to him were extremely fond of him. There was an emotional engagement. People in his circle felt very strongly about him. That's rare enough today," he said.

Cathal McCabe, director of the Irish Writers' Centre, said: "A member of Aosdána and friend of the Irish Writers' Centre, where he read on numerous occasions, the centre would like to convey its deepest sympathies to the poet's family and friends."

Liddy was educated at University College Dublin and the King's Inns. A member of Aosdána, he lived in the US for more than 20 years.