Patrick Deeley

Patrick Deeley (born 1953) is an Irish poet.

Patrick Deeley is a poet, memoirist and children’s writer from Mullagh, Loughrea, County Galway. He is a full-time writer, having retired from his post as administrative principal of a primary school in 2012. His tenth collection of poems, Keepsake, was published by Dedalus Press in 2024. His best-selling, critically acclaimed memoir, The Hurley Maker’s Son, published by Transworld in 2016, was shortlisted for the Irish Non-fiction Book of the Year Award.

Patrick Deeley's writing has featured in leading literary journals in Ireland, the UK, USA, Canada, Argentina and Australia, and been translated to French, Italian, Spanish, Ukrainian and other languages. A selection of poems, Territoire/Territory appeared from Alidades Press in 2010. Le Ossa della Creazione was published by Kolibris Edizione in 2011. He received the American-based Lawrence O’Shaughnessy Award for 2019, the Dermot Healy International Poetry Prize, and the Bisto and Eilis Dillon Awards for children’s literature. He also received Bursaries in Literature for 1999, 2017 and 2021 from The Arts Council of Ireland, and his poem ‘Woodman’ was selected as one of Ireland’s 100 Favourite Poems following a survey by The Irish Times in 2001.

Patrick Deeley served on the Council of Poetry Ireland from 1984 to 1989. He has presented lectures for post-graduate students on literary exchange programmes at TCD and has read and conducted workshops at festivals in Ireland, USA, Finland and the UK. His highly acclaimed summer course for teachers, ‘Poetry in the Classroom’, based on poem-making with children in Ballyfermot, received Department of Education commendation and was published in ‘The Magic Emerald’, a textbook for teachers and schoolchildren, by CJ Fallon.