Overview

Inspired by the harrowing events surrounding the often overlooked Ballymurphy Massacre in the north of Ireland, Stephanie Ní Thiarnaigh's powerful poetry collection, The Weight of a Feather, delves into the depths of truth and justice. In 2021, an inquest in Belfast finally shed light on these tragic deaths, revealing the families' nearly five-decade struggle for justice amidst persistent disinformation and propaganda from the British military. The title of this collection echoes an ancient Egyptian belief: upon death, a person's heart, symbolizing their life's deeds, was weighed against the feather of Maat, the goddess of truth and justice. This concept weaves through the poems, urging readers to reflect on the nature of truth and to weigh the evidence, consider the human cost of conflict, and make their own judgments.

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9781916938397

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Reviews

Incisive and devastating, this is a vital, mesmerising and necessary study into a hidden history. The complexity and inventiveness refuses to be alienating and showcases a new potential of what poetry can bring to historical and political events. A masterful work that stays with you long after reading. - Ciar�n Hodgers There are ways in which art and the artist can more adequately capture and convey history, collective trauma, and deep feeling than simple record keeping. N� Thiarnaigh, through poetry that has striking clarity and surrealist beauty, delicately weaves the dark truth of the past with the reality of its unresolved impacts. Innovations in form combine with gut-punching revelations, leaving readers both tender and confronted. The Weight of a Feather is all at once gorgeous, haunting, heartbreaking, and necessary. - Abhainn Connolly The Weight of a Feather cuts to the sinew of the 1971 Ballymurphy massacre. Bearing witness to work a poet less profound would shy away from. - Lauren Foley

Incisive and devastating, this is a vital, mesmerising and necessary study into a hidden history. The complexity and inventiveness refuses to be alienating and showcases a new potential of what poetry can bring to historical and political events. A masterful work that stays with you long after reading. - Ciarán Hodgers There are ways in which art and the artist can more adequately capture and convey history, collective trauma, and deep feeling than simple record keeping. Ní Thiarnaigh, through poetry that has striking clarity and surrealist beauty, delicately weaves the dark truth of the past with the reality of its unresolved impacts. Innovations in form combine with gut-punching revelations, leaving readers both tender and confronted. The Weight of a Feather is all at once gorgeous, haunting, heartbreaking, and necessary. - Abhainn Connolly The Weight of a Feather cuts to the sinew of the 1971 Ballymurphy massacre. Bearing witness to work a poet less profound would shy away from. - Lauren Foley

Author Information

Stephanie Ní Thiarnaigh is an Irish multidisciplinary artist and poet based in Drogheda, Co. Louth, Ireland. She co-hosts the Irish Mythology Podcast and is a co-founder and member of Boann Art Collective. Her work explores folklore, mythology, memory, power, class, labour, the state, and the otherworld. Her work has been published in Splonk, Queerlings, Red Ogre Review, Pile Press, and elsewhere. This is her debut poetry collection.

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