As an undergraduate, Seamus Heaney visited Station Island several times, an ancient pilgrimage site traditionally associated with St Patrick and purgatory. Decades later, Heaney worked through competing calls for political engagement and his long-lapsed Catholicism in ‘Station Island’, a poem he described as an ‘exorcism’.A dreamlike reworking of Dante’s Purgatorio, ‘Station Island’ describes Heaney’s encounters with the ghosts of childhood acquaintances, literary heroes and victims of the Troubles. Seamus and Mark explore Heaney’s unusually autobiographical poem, which wrestles with the inescapability of politics.Non-subscribers will only hear an extract from this episode. To listen to the full episode, and all our other Close Readings series, subscribe: Directly in Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/4dbjbjG In other podcast apps: lrb.me/closereadings Further reading in the LRB:Paul Muldoon: Sweaney Peregrainehttps://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v06/n20/paul-muldoon/sweaney-peregraineSeamus Perry: We Did and We Didn’thttps://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v43/n09/seamus-perry/we-did-and-we-didn-tJohn Kerrigan: Hand and Foothttps://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v21/n11/john-kerrigan/hand-and-foot Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.