Background
The son of Timothy O'Sullivan (b Tralee, Ireland) and Myra O'Sullivan (née McKean) O'Sullivan was the youngest of five children.
The son of Timothy O'Sullivan (b Tralee, Ireland) and Myra O'Sullivan (née McKean) O'Sullivan was the youngest of five children.
He attended St Joseph's primary Grey Lynn and Sacred Heart College. He graduated from the University of Auckland and Oxford University. He lectured at Victoria University of Wellington (1963–66) and the University of Waikato (1968–78).
Dominic O'Sullivan (1970) and Deirdre O'Sullivan (1973). He served as literary editor of the NZ Listener (1979–80). His poems display an irreverence that shades into reverence: God is spoken of with fondness and slight regret, as if O’Sullivan is remembering a character who belongs to a previous book (which, he might say, is what God is).
This poem is in many ways typical of O'Sullivan's strengths: it has a lyric eloquence that never shies away from, often embraces, difficult sometimes philosophical subject matter and is a good introduction – as is the volume as a whole – to his work in general.