• Colour drawing of a staged theatrical scene framed by two symmetrical classical structures with niches containing gilded statues, flanked by trees. At the centre, a painted backdrop shows an island within an archipelago, with a visible settlement; in the foreground, a vessel approaches the shore. Four figures stand before the backdrop holding branches and other objects. The composition is enclosed within a thin rectangular gold border.

Seamus Heaney, Virgil and the Good of Poetry

The work and life of Seamus Heaney (1939-2013) were, in Bill Clinton’s words, a gift to the world: ‘His mind, heart, and his uniquely Irish gift for language made him our finest poet of the rhythms of ordinary lives.’