February 28, 1929

Irish poet John Montague was born on this day in 1929 in Brooklyn, New York. During the Depression years, Montague was sent back to Ireland and was raised in Tyrone by his two aunts. He went on to study at University College Dublin in 1946, where he was first inspired to write poetry by a post-war atmosphere in Dublin. Several of his poems were published in literary magazines. In 1953, Montague won the Fullbright Fellowship and went to study at Yale University. There, he was mentored by writer Robert Penn Warren. Montague spent some time in Paris, but eventually returned to Ireland in the 60s. He completed his long sequence of poems called “The Rough Field” and then went on to teach at the University of College Cork.