Special guest to join 'Books & Brunch' discussion of Seamus Heaney book Feb. 22

The National Press Club's Books and Brunch Group will meet in the Club's Fourth Estate restaurant at noon on Saturday, Feb. 22, to discuss the poet Seamus Heaney's "Human Chain," the Nobel Prize winner's last published work before his death last year.

Joining the Group for the discussion will be Merrill Leffler -- poet, editor, teacher and publisher -- who has been a central figure on the metropolitan Washington, D.C. literary scene for more than 45 years. He has authored three books of poetry, including most recently "Mark the Music," and published numerous individual collections by a number of poets as well as anthologies in his Dryad Press.

Heaney, an Irish native, has been described as the most important Irish poet since W.B. Yeats. He was the author of more than 30 books of poetry, prose, plays and translations. In addition to the Nobel, he received the T.S. Eliot Prize, the PEN Translation Prize and two Whitbread Prizes. He was both the Harvard and the Oxford Professor of Poetry.

Leffler received a three-year fellowship to Oxford University, taught literature at the U.S. Naval Academy and the University of Maryland and poetry writing at The Writer's Center in Bethesda, Md., where he was one of the founders.

He will read from Heany's work and comment on individual poems in the collection, as well as engage in discussions with the attendees.

The session is open to all NPC members and guests. There is no charge for the event, but please RSVP your plans to attend to Jack Williams, the Books & Brunch chair, at [email protected] so that enough seats will be available. Brunch will be available for purchase in the Fourth Estate restaurant, site of the meeting.

On March 15 Books and Brunch will discuss a novel, ”The Sojourn” by Andrew Krivak.