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Dr. Seán Hewitt

Assistant Professor (English)
      
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Dr. Seán Hewitt

Assistant Professor (English)

 shewitt@tcd.ie

 


Seán Hewitt, FRSL, is a poet, novelist, memoirist and critic. His first collection of poetry, Tongues of Fire (Jonathan Cape, 2020), was shortlisted for The Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award, and won The Laurel Prize in 2021. His second collection of poems, Rapture's Road (Jonathan Cape, 2024), was longlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize. All Down Darkness Wide (Jonathan Cape, 2022), a memoir, won The Rooney Prize for Irish Literature in 2022, and 300,000 Kisses: Tales of Queer Love from the Ancient World, a collaboration with the artist Luke Edward Hall, was published by Penguin, in 2023. His debut novel is Open, Heaven (2025). Seán's work has been translated into more than ten languages. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Seán also has an ongoing interest in the literature of the Irish Revival, ecopoetics, and literature and science. His monograph J.M. Synge: Nature, Politics, Modernism, was published by Oxford University Press in 2021, and he has written on figures such as W.B. Yeats, Lady Gregory, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Roger Casement, and Emily Lawless. Seán teaches across undergraduate and postgraduate levels, on the MPhil Creative Writing, and supervises candidates for the PhD in Literary Practice. Selected Publications Open, Heaven. Novel. Jonathan Cape (2025), Knopf (USA and Canada, 2025), Einaudi (Italy, 2025), Suhrkamp (Germany, 2025), Robert Laffont (France, 2025), De Arbeiderspers (Netherlands, 2025), Solumbokvennen (Norway, 2025), Gyldendal (Denmark, 2025), Urano (Spain, 2025), Stereoma (Greece, 2025) Rapture's Road. Poetry. Jonathan Cape (2024), Knopf (USA, 2026) Three Hundred Thousand Kisses: Queer Love in the Ancient World, illustrated by Luke Edward Hall. Translation / Anthology. Penguin: Particular Books (2023), Clarkson Potter (USA, 2023), L'Ippocampo (Italy, 2024), HarperCollins Brazil (Brazil, 2024), Eulyoo (South Korea, 2025), Editions Ducasse (France, 2025) All Down Darkness Wide. Memoir. Jonathan Cape (2022), Penguin Press (USA, 2022), Solum Bokvennen (Norway, 2022), De Arbeiderspers (Netherlands, 2023), Literarna Basta (Czechia, 2024), Urano (Spain, 2026) J.M. Synge: Nature, Politics, Modernism. Critical study. Oxford University Press (2021) Buile Suibhne. Poems. with illustrations by Amy Jeffs. Fine Press Poetry (2021) Tongues of Fire. Poems. Jonathan Cape (2020), Knopf (USA, 2026)
Details Date
Judge for David Cohen Lifetime Achievement Award 2025 2025
Judge for The Dylan Thomas Prize, 2024 January 2024 - July 2024
External assessor, University College Cork hiring committee August 2023
Peer reviewer, Liverpool University Press 01/01/2022
Judge for PEN Heaney Prize 2025
Advisory Board Member, Diversifying Irish Poetry: Poetry Critics of Colour in Ireland 2020
Mentor, Poetry Ireland Introductions 2021
Mentor, Irish Writers Centre / Dublin Book Festival Young Writer Delegates scheme 2022
Mentor, Diversifying Irish Poetry: Poetry Critics of Colour in Ireland 2021
Mentor, Ledbury Emerging Poetry Critics Scheme 2021
Peer Reviewer: Liverpool University Press Modern Language Association (MLA) Studi irlandesi: A Journal of Irish Studies English Studies The Parish Review ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment 2020
Details Date From Date To
Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature 12/07/2023 present
Seán Hewitt, J.M. Synge: Nature, Politics, Modernism, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2021, 1-256pp, Book, PUBLISHED  URL
Seán Hewitt, Gerard Manley Hopkins's "Skies of Couple-Colour", Victorian Poetry, 58, (3), 2021, Journal Article, PUBLISHED  URL
Seán Hewitt, Emily Lawless, Natural History, and the Possibilities of Enchantment, Irish University Review, 54, (2), 2024, Journal Article, PUBLISHED  URL
Queerness and Homosociality in, editor(s)Martin Dubois , Gerard Manley Hopkins in Context, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2023, [Seán Hewitt], Book Chapter, PUBLISHED
Nineteenth Century Contexts, (2021), Seán Hewitt ; Anna Pilz, [eds.], Notes: [Special issue: "Ecologies of the Atlantic Archipelago"], Journal, IN_PRESS
Fairy and Folk Tales of Bedford Park in, editor(s)Lauren Arrington and Matthew Campbell , The Oxford Handbook of W.B. Yeats, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2023, [Seán Hewitt], Book Chapter, PUBLISHED
Yeats's Sacred Grove in, editor(s)Susanne Hobson and Andrew Radford , The Edinburgh Companion to Modernism, Myth and Religion, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2023, pp285 - 298, [Seán Hewitt], Book Chapter, PUBLISHED
Derek Mahon's "Late Sacramental Gleam" in, editor(s)Nicholas Grene and Tom Walker , Derek Mahon: A Retrospective, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2023, [Sean Hewitt], Book Chapter, PUBLISHED
Seán Hewitt, The Comedies of the Irish Revival, Forum for Modern Language Studies, 2022, Journal Article, PUBLISHED
Sean Hewitt, Yeats's Re-Enchanted Nature, International Yeats Studies, 2, (2), 2018, p1 - 20, Journal Article, PUBLISHED  TARA - Full Text  URL
  

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Seán Hewitt, Open, Heaven, Jonathan Cape, 2025, Book, PUBLISHED
Seán Hewitt, All Down Darkness Wide, London, Jonathan Cape, 2022, 1 - 240pp, Book, PUBLISHED
Seán Hewitt, Rapture's Road, London, Jonathan Cape, 2024, 1 - 80pp, Book, PUBLISHED
Seán Hewitt, Tongues of Fire, London, Jonathan Cape, 2020, 80pp, Book, PUBLISHED
Seán Hewitt, 300,000 Kisses: Tales of Queer Love in the Ancient World, London, Penguin: Particular Books, 2023, 1 - 208pp, Book, PUBLISHED
Introduction in, editor(s)n/a , The Persian Boy, London, 2024, [Seán Hewitt], Book Chapter, PUBLISHED
Introduction in, I Put a Spell on You, London, Vintage, 2025, [Sean Hewitt], Book Chapter, IN_PRESS
Introduction in, Some Poems of Roger Casement, Dublin, New Island Books, 2025, [Sean Hewitt], Book Chapter, IN_PRESS
Sean Hewitt, 'Lantern', London, Offord Road Books, 2019, -, Poetry, PUBLISHED

  


Award Date
Fellowship of the Royal Society of Literature July 2023
Rooney Prize for Irish Literature 2020
Maurice J Bric Medal of Excellence (Irish Research Council) 2020
The Laurel Prize 2021
Contemporary Poetry; Ecocriticism; Irish Writing; Queer Literature; Fiction; the Irish Revival; Modernism; Poetics; Science and Literature