Unlike most of the poets you are studying, the man is alive! 

A native of Dartmouth Square, Dublin 4, he is generously decorated with a variety of poetry awards.

He studied arts in UCD. Durcan tells of a a difficult relationship with his father, a judge, who used to physically punish him. He tells of having been bundled and taken to a psychiatric hospital against his will, being treated disrespectfully and the experience leaving him traumatised. He denies having been mentally ill. 

Durcan and his wife split up in 1977.