SOURCE: “Mr. Kavanagh's Progress,” in Studies: An Irish Quarterly Review, Vol. 49, No. 195, Autumn, 1960, pp. 295–304.

In the excerpt below, Jordan examines the evidence of maturing consciousness in Kavanagh's poetry and points out its stylistic strengths and weaknesses.

‘The people didn't want a poet, but a fool,           yes they could be doing with one of those.’ 

The Green Fool (1938)

‘The story of the heifer that came back is nearly symbolic of my life. I have failed many times to get my cattle to the fair.’

—Ibid.

It would be foolish for the present writer to pretend that he is not personally acquainted with Mr Patrick Kavanagh. It would be even more foolish to write about him as if his slight acquaintance gave any right to attempt an authoritative interpretation of a small but very difficult body of work, on the grounds of extraneous assumptions as to character or personality.¹ What...