Tom Paulin
Encyclopedia
Thomas Neilson Paulin is a Northern Irish
poet and critic
of film
, music
and literature
. He lives in England, where he is the GM Young Lecturer
in English Literature
at Hertford College, Oxford
.
and Paulin grew up in a middle class area of the city. According to Paulin, his parents, a doctor and headmaster, held "vaguely socialist liberal views". While still a teenager, Paulin joined the Trotskyist Socialist Labour League.
Paulin was educated at Annadale Grammar School
, Hull University and Lincoln College, Oxford
. From 1972 to 1994, he worked at the University of Nottingham
, first as a lecturer
and then as a Reader
of Poetry. In 1977, he won the Somerset Maugham prize for his poetry collection A State of Justice and later established his reputation as a literary critic
with work such as Minotaur: Poetry and the Nation State (1992). Recently he has championed the work of literary and social critic William Hazlitt
and has taken part in a successful campaign to have Hazlitt's gravestone refurbished.
Paulin is considered to be among a group of writers from a Unionist
background "who have attempted to recover the radical Protestant republican
heritage of the eighteenth century to challenge orthodox concepts" of Northern Irish Protestant identity.
Paulin is most widely-known in Britain for his appearances on the late-night BBC
arts programmes The Late Show
, Late Review and Newsnight Review, where he has established a reputation not only for his acerbic judgements but also for the unusual quality of some of his language (for instance, he once described the sound of Blur
's 13
album as "like barbed wire
at the bottom of a pond".). He is also not averse to becoming involved in bad-tempered arguments with other regular guests such as Germaine Greer
.
His appearances on Newsnight Review were parodied on the Adam and Joe
show's Toy Review. It featured a stuffed-toy tortoise with an Irish accent called Tom Tortoise, who strongly resembled Paulin.
Following the success of the Field Day Theatre Company's tour of Brian Friel
's play Translations
in late 1980, the two founding directors (Brian Friel and Stephen Rea) decided to make Field Day a permanent enterprise; thus, to qualify for financial support from both the Northern Irish and the Irish governments, they expanded the governing board from the original two members to six: Brian Friel, Stephen Rea, Seamus Deane
, Seamus Heaney
, David Hammond, and Tom Paulin. In 2009 he translated Euripedes's Medea
.
. In the poem Paulin referred to the 'Zionist SS'.
Controversy following an interview he gave to the state-owned Egypt
ian newspaper Al-Ahram Weekly
, in which he told the newspaper that Brooklyn
-born Jewish settlers "should be shot dead" and that "they are Nazis, racists. I feel nothing but hatred for them". Paulin described what the Israeli government is doing in Palestine as "an historical obscenity." When asked how he responds to accusations of anti-Semitism that follow such descriptions, he told the newspaper: "I just laugh when they do that to me. It does not worry me at all. These are the Hampstead
liberal Zionists. I have utter contempt for them. They use this card of anti-Semitism. They fill newspapers with hate letters. They are useless people."
Paulin considers his statements to be anti-Zionist
; in the interview, Paulin said he “never believed that Israel had the right to exist at all.” Paulin has described himself as a lifelong opponent of anti-Semitism, and also stated that he does "not support attacks on Israeli citizens under any circumstances." In an interview with the Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram, he was quoted as saying "I can understand how suicide bombers feel. It is an expression of deep injustice and tragedy", and in the Jerusalem Post that "It is better to resort to conventional guerrilla warfare. I think that attacks on civilians in fact boost morale. Hitler bombed London into submission, but in fact it created a sense of national solidarity."
The interview resulted in the cancellation and subsequent reinstatement of Paulin's invitation to deliver the Morris Gray Lecture at Harvard University.
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland is one of the four countries of the United Kingdom. Situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, it shares a border with the Republic of Ireland to the south and west...
poet and critic
Critic
A critic is anyone who expresses a value judgement. Informally, criticism is a common aspect of all human expression and need not necessarily imply skilled or accurate expressions of judgement. Critical judgements, good or bad, may be positive , negative , or balanced...
of film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
, music
Music
Music is an art form whose medium is sound and silence. Its common elements are pitch , rhythm , dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture...
and literature
Literature
Literature is the art of written works, and is not bound to published sources...
. He lives in England, where he is the GM Young Lecturer
Lecturer
Lecturer is an academic rank. In the United Kingdom, lecturer is a position at a university or similar institution, often held by academics in their early career stages, who lead research groups and supervise research students, as well as teach...
in English Literature
English literature
English literature is the literature written in the English language, including literature composed in English by writers not necessarily from England; for example, Robert Burns was Scottish, James Joyce was Irish, Joseph Conrad was Polish, Dylan Thomas was Welsh, Edgar Allan Poe was American, J....
at Hertford College, Oxford
Hertford College, Oxford
Hertford College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. It is located in Catte Street, directly opposite the main entrance of the original Bodleian Library. As of 2006, the college had a financial endowment of £52m. There are 612 students , plus various visiting...
.
Life and work
While he was still young, Paulin's Northern Irish Protestant mother and English father moved from Leeds to BelfastBelfast
Belfast is the capital of and largest city in Northern Ireland. By population, it is the 14th biggest city in the United Kingdom and second biggest on the island of Ireland . It is the seat of the devolved government and legislative Northern Ireland Assembly...
and Paulin grew up in a middle class area of the city. According to Paulin, his parents, a doctor and headmaster, held "vaguely socialist liberal views". While still a teenager, Paulin joined the Trotskyist Socialist Labour League.
Paulin was educated at Annadale Grammar School
Annadale Grammar School
Annadale Grammar School for Boys was an all-boys school located on the Annadale Embankment skirting the River Lagan in south Belfast, Northern Ireland...
, Hull University and Lincoln College, Oxford
Lincoln College, Oxford
Lincoln College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. It is situated on Turl Street in central Oxford, backing onto Brasenose College and adjacent to Exeter College...
. From 1972 to 1994, he worked at the University of Nottingham
University of Nottingham
The University of Nottingham is a public research university based in Nottingham, United Kingdom, with further campuses in Ningbo, China and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia...
, first as a lecturer
Lecturer
Lecturer is an academic rank. In the United Kingdom, lecturer is a position at a university or similar institution, often held by academics in their early career stages, who lead research groups and supervise research students, as well as teach...
and then as a Reader
Reader (academic rank)
The title of Reader in the United Kingdom and some universities in the Commonwealth nations like Australia and New Zealand denotes an appointment for a senior academic with a distinguished international reputation in research or scholarship...
of Poetry. In 1977, he won the Somerset Maugham prize for his poetry collection A State of Justice and later established his reputation as a literary critic
Literary criticism
Literary criticism is the study, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. Modern literary criticism is often informed by literary theory, which is the philosophical discussion of its methods and goals...
with work such as Minotaur: Poetry and the Nation State (1992). Recently he has championed the work of literary and social critic William Hazlitt
William Hazlitt
William Hazlitt was an English writer, remembered for his humanistic essays and literary criticism, and as a grammarian and philosopher. He is now considered one of the great critics and essayists of the English language, placed in the company of Samuel Johnson and George Orwell. Yet his work is...
and has taken part in a successful campaign to have Hazlitt's gravestone refurbished.
Paulin is considered to be among a group of writers from a Unionist
Unionism in Ireland
Unionism in Ireland is an ideology that favours the continuation of some form of political union between the islands of Ireland and Great Britain...
background "who have attempted to recover the radical Protestant republican
Irish Republicanism
Irish republicanism is an ideology based on the belief that all of Ireland should be an independent republic.In 1801, under the Act of Union, the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of Ireland merged to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland...
heritage of the eighteenth century to challenge orthodox concepts" of Northern Irish Protestant identity.
Paulin is most widely-known in Britain for his appearances on the late-night BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
arts programmes The Late Show
The Late Show (BBC2 TV series)
The Late Show is a British television arts magazine programme that was broadcast on BBC Two weeknights at 11.15pm — directly after Newsnight — often referred to as the "graveyard slot" in terms of television scheduling....
, Late Review and Newsnight Review, where he has established a reputation not only for his acerbic judgements but also for the unusual quality of some of his language (for instance, he once described the sound of Blur
Blur (band)
Blur is an English alternative rock band. Formed in London in 1989 as Seymour, the group consists of singer Damon Albarn, guitarist Graham Coxon, bassist Alex James and drummer Dave Rowntree. Blur's debut album Leisure incorporated the sounds of Madchester and shoegazing...
's 13
13 (Blur album)
13 is the sixth album by English band Blur, released in March 1999. The album reached number one in the UK Albums Chart and number 80 in the US Billboard 200. 13 spawned three hit singles: "Tender", "Coffee & TV" and "No Distance Left to Run"...
album as "like barbed wire
Barbed wire
Barbed wire, also known as barb wire , is a type of fencing wire constructed with sharp edges or points arranged at intervals along the strand. It is used to construct inexpensive fences and is used atop walls surrounding secured property...
at the bottom of a pond".). He is also not averse to becoming involved in bad-tempered arguments with other regular guests such as Germaine Greer
Germaine Greer
Germaine Greer is an Australian writer, academic, journalist and scholar of early modern English literature, widely regarded as one of the most significant feminist voices of the later 20th century....
.
His appearances on Newsnight Review were parodied on the Adam and Joe
Adam and Joe
Adam Buxton and Joe Cornish are British comedy performers known together as Adam and Joe. They are best known for presenting Adam and Joe on BBC 6 Music, and The Adam and Joe Show on Channel 4 from 1996 to 2001.-History:...
show's Toy Review. It featured a stuffed-toy tortoise with an Irish accent called Tom Tortoise, who strongly resembled Paulin.
Following the success of the Field Day Theatre Company's tour of Brian Friel
Brian Friel
Brian Friel is an Irish dramatist, author and director of the Field Day Theatre Company. He is considered to be the greatest living English-language dramatist, hailed by the English-speaking world as an "Irish Chekhov" and "the universally accented voice of Ireland"...
's play Translations
Translations
Translations is a three-act play by Irish playwright Brian Friel written in 1980. It is set in Baile Beag , a small village at the heart of 19th century agricultural Ireland...
in late 1980, the two founding directors (Brian Friel and Stephen Rea) decided to make Field Day a permanent enterprise; thus, to qualify for financial support from both the Northern Irish and the Irish governments, they expanded the governing board from the original two members to six: Brian Friel, Stephen Rea, Seamus Deane
Seamus Deane
Seamus Deane is an Irish poet, novelist, and critic.Born in Derry, Northern Ireland, Deane was born into a Catholic nationalist family. He attended St. Columb's College in Derry, Queen's University Belfast and Pembroke College, Cambridge University . At St...
, Seamus Heaney
Seamus Heaney
Seamus Heaney is an Irish poet, writer and lecturer. He lives in Dublin. Heaney has received the Nobel Prize in Literature , the Golden Wreath of Poetry , T. S. Eliot Prize and two Whitbread prizes...
, David Hammond, and Tom Paulin. In 2009 he translated Euripedes's Medea
Medea (play)
Medea is an ancient Greek tragedy written by Euripides, based upon the myth of Jason and Medea and first produced in 431 BC. The plot centers on the barbarian protagonist as she finds her position in the Greek world threatened, and the revenge she takes against her husband Jason who has betrayed...
.
Controversy
Paulin was the subject of controversy in 2001 and 2002 following the publication of his poem Killed in Crossfire in the British newspaper The ObserverThe Observer
The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
. In the poem Paulin referred to the 'Zionist SS'.
Controversy following an interview he gave to the state-owned Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
ian newspaper Al-Ahram Weekly
Al-Ahram
Al-Ahram , founded in 1875, is the most widely circulating Egyptian daily newspaper, and the second oldest after al-Waqa'i`al-Masriya . It is majority owned by the Egyptian government....
, in which he told the newspaper that Brooklyn
Brooklyn
Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...
-born Jewish settlers "should be shot dead" and that "they are Nazis, racists. I feel nothing but hatred for them". Paulin described what the Israeli government is doing in Palestine as "an historical obscenity." When asked how he responds to accusations of anti-Semitism that follow such descriptions, he told the newspaper: "I just laugh when they do that to me. It does not worry me at all. These are the Hampstead
Hampstead
Hampstead is an area of London, England, north-west of Charing Cross. Part of the London Borough of Camden in Inner London, it is known for its intellectual, liberal, artistic, musical and literary associations and for Hampstead Heath, a large, hilly expanse of parkland...
liberal Zionists. I have utter contempt for them. They use this card of anti-Semitism. They fill newspapers with hate letters. They are useless people."
Paulin considers his statements to be anti-Zionist
Zionism
Zionism is a Jewish political movement that, in its broadest sense, has supported the self-determination of the Jewish people in a sovereign Jewish national homeland. Since the establishment of the State of Israel, the Zionist movement continues primarily to advocate on behalf of the Jewish state...
; in the interview, Paulin said he “never believed that Israel had the right to exist at all.” Paulin has described himself as a lifelong opponent of anti-Semitism, and also stated that he does "not support attacks on Israeli citizens under any circumstances." In an interview with the Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram, he was quoted as saying "I can understand how suicide bombers feel. It is an expression of deep injustice and tragedy", and in the Jerusalem Post that "It is better to resort to conventional guerrilla warfare. I think that attacks on civilians in fact boost morale. Hitler bombed London into submission, but in fact it created a sense of national solidarity."
The interview resulted in the cancellation and subsequent reinstatement of Paulin's invitation to deliver the Morris Gray Lecture at Harvard University.
External links
- Tom Paulin: Poetic polemicist BBC News, 15 November 2002 - Profile