Fintan O'Toole to write authorised Seamus Heaney biography

Faber & Faber have confirmed Irish Times writer Fintan O'Toole as the man who'll be knitting together a major work on the much garlanded Seamus Heaney, which is expected in 2019.
O'Toole will be given full access to the family archives, and talk to dozens of people closely associated with his early days and subsequent rise to Nobel-winning prominence.

O'Toole might want to have a chat with Manic Street Preacher, Nicky Wire, who's a massive fan.

"I think Seamus was to Ireland what R.S. Thomas was to Wales – some sort of barometer of culture and wellbeing in the nation, which is a fucking amazing thing to achieve at that level," Nicky told Hot Press. "Music’s hard, but being a poet is the hardest art form to ever make a living from. It takes a fucking long while to get there and even then the rewards are not that big.

“He had a face that was just full of love, I guess,” he continued. “Full of love and meaning…”

More immediately, Faber are publishing a new tome from former Slits member, Viv Albertine, on April 5. The follow-up to her Clothes, Clothes, Clothes. Music, Music, Music. Boys, Boys, Boys memoir, To Throw Away Unopened is another deeply personal affair.

"‘Mum’s last moments ruined; my relationship with my sister irredeemable; and possibly the loss of my thumb," Viv writes. "All big losses but nothing compared to what I was fighting for. What was I fighting for, though? Even now I’m not sure. Something so old and so deep, it has no words, no shape, no logic.’

According to the PR personages: "To Throw Away Unopened is a fearless dissection of one woman’s obsession with the truth – the truth about family, power, and her identity as a rebel and outsider. It is a gaping wound of a book. An exercise in blood-letting and psychological archaeology, excavating what lies beneath: the fear, the loneliness, the anger. It is a brutal expose of human dysfunctionality, the impossibility of true intimacy, and the damage wrought upon us by secrets and revelations, siblings and parents.

"Yet it is also a testament to how we can rebuild ourselves and come to face the world again. It is a portrait of the love stories that constitute a life, often bringing as much pain as joy. With the inimitable blend of humour, vulnerability, and intelligence that makes Viv Albertine one of our finest authors working today, To Throw Away Unopened smashes through layers of propriety and leads us into a new place of savage self-discovery."

Among those who've had a sneak read are Irish author Eimear McBride who reckons it to be: "Crackling with anger and brimming with insight into the dirty business of art, family and being a woman in a hostile world.’"

We look forward to both!