Group Sheets

At each of its meetings, the Belfast Group read drafts of poetry, short stories, or other prose works of its members. To facilitate the discussion, Philip Hobsbaum—with the assistance of Cilla Craig, the secretary in the English Department at Queen’s University, Belfast, or his wife Hannah—prepared typed copies of the drafts that would be discussed. These “Group sheets,” as they are now known, were distributed to Group members prior to meetings.

There are ninety-four distinct Group sheets in the collections of Queen’s and Emory University. An additional Group sheet is in private hands. The list below details the contents of individual Group sheets, including the author and the names of the works that appeared in draft form. A selection of these Group sheets have been made available as digital editions and provide a window into the process of writing and re-writing poetry.

The Group sheets have been organized into two broad time periods, corresponding to when Hobsbaum was with the Group (1963–March 1966) and after he left (1966–1972). Most of the Group sheets are undated, but some include handwritten dates, times, and places. Absent that information, we have assumed that undated sheets in Hobsbaum’s papers are from the Group’s first time period and that undated sheets from other collections are from the second period.

A note about capitalization: our data is drawn directly from the catalogues at Queen’s and Emory. Since rules for title capitalization differ between the UK and the US, the formatting of each Group sheet reflects where it is catalogued.

Displaying 66 Group sheets.

  • Ashton, Victor. “Beyond the pale,” “Invoking the muses,” “Down to basics,” “The fighting cock,” “Sense and sensibility,” “The house off the road,” “The outsider,” “Running through windy gap,” no date, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Bond, John; Simmons, James. “David Gallacher,” “That sailor,” “American settler’s soliloquy,” “Confession,” no date.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Bond, John. “Domus a nun,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Bond, John. “Sick visiting,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Bond, John. “Untitled ["Mam."],” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Bredin, Hugh T.. “Ordination day,” no date, seven pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Bredin, Hugh T.. “The kingdom of heaven,” no date, four pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Brophy, Michael. “Morning paper,” “Home from the holidays,” “Grey ashes,” “The virgin,” “Motive for murder,” “The last bus,” “This is your life,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Bull, Iris. “A childhood,” “Circe,” “The visit,” “Baby,” “Death of an uncle,” “Hospital,” no date, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Bull, Iris. “The fairground,” “The drowned man,” “Remnants,” “A literary pilgrimage,” “The new creation,” “Leah and Rachel,” “The old man,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Buller, Norman. “A professor asleep,” “Conscripts,” “The mortal cold,” “The ignorant desire,” “The aboriginal,” “Aubade,” “Passion flowers,” “Tchaikowski’s mistress,” no date, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Croskery, Lynette M.. “The dress,” “The telegram,” “The daisy chain,” 22 Mar 1966, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Dugdale, Norman. “The new men,” “Laertes,” “Reasons of state,” “Frontier incident,” “To Venus,” “Dublin,” “The disposition of the weather,” no date, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Foster, Rodney. Untitled poetry no date, four pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Gallagher, Maurice. “The ship: a once act play,” no date.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Gallagher, Maurice. “Tragrainey,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Gallagher, Maurice. Untitled short story 1965, four pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Gallagher, Maurice. Untitled short story no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Harvey, W.J.. “The poem in October,” “Reading Drayton in October,” “Hart Crane,” “Sea-side song,” “Leni Riefenstahl’s Olympiad: 1936,” “The sorcerer’s apprentice,” “Arriving at Larne: seasick,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Heaney, Seamus. “Boy driving his father to confession,” “To a wine jar,” “On Hogarth’s engraving 'Pit ticket for the royal sport',” “Synge on Aran,” “Blackberry-picking,” “Saint Francis and the birds,” “At a potato digging,” no date, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Heaney, Seamus. “Digging,” “Death of a naturalist,” “Storm on the island,” “Soliloquy for an old resident,” “Writer and teacher,” “Young bachelor,” “Scaffolding,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Heaney, Seamus. “Docker,” “An advancement of learning,” “Fisher,” “Amputation,” “National trust,” “A Cistercian speaks,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Heaney, Seamus. “Elegy for an unborn child,” “Triptych for the Easter battlers,” “Homage to Pieter Brueghel,” “Persephone,” “Rookery,” “Requiem for the Irish Rebels,” “The peninsula,” “Orange drums, Tyrone 1966,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Heaney, Seamus. “Oh brave new bull…,” “Mid-term break,” “A pillar of the community,” “MacKenna’s Saturday night,” “Turkeys observed,” “The indomitable Irishry,” “Obituary,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Heaney, Seamus. “Taking stock: 5/4/’64,” “Twice shy,” “The early purges,” “In Glenelly valley,” “Ex-champ,” “The evangelist,” “Men’s confessions,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Heaney, Seamus. “The diviner,” “Gravities,” “Ancestral photograph,” “For the commander of 'The Eliza',” “Personal helicon,” “Girls bathing, Galway 1965,” “The salmon fisher to the salmon,” no date.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Hobsbaum, Philip. “Dead end,” “Derry city,” “The riding-mistress,” “A false martyr,” “Undergraduate party,” “Stout person’s meditation on sex,” “Cock of the walk,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Hobsbaum, Philip. “In Retreat,” no date, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Hobsbaum, Philip. “K.1,” no date, five pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Hobsbaum, Philip. “Study in a minor key,” no date, six pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Hobsbaum, Hannah. “When Rebecca Comes,” no date, eight pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Johnston, J. K.. “The park,” “On being pushed over the edge of a cliff,” “The eyes,” “Songs of a drunken street,” “Prostitutes,” “Violent progression,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Longley, Michael. “Circe,” “The ornithological section,” “Orpheus,” “A personal statement,” “The Centaurs,” “The housewife’s testament,” “Christopher at birth,” no date, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Longley, Michael. “Dr. Johnson on the Hebrides,” “Leaving Inishmore,” “Camouflage,” “Persephone,” “To Derek Mahon,” “A working holiday,” “Words for jazz perhaps,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Longley, Michael. “In memoriam,” “Christopher at birth,” “Freeze-up,” “Saint Francis to the birds,” “Elegy for Fats Waller,” “Epithalamion,” “En route,” no date, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Longley, Michael. “No continuing city,” “A slight adultery,” “The journey,” “To Edna,” “Her mime of the lame seagull,” “The Hebrides,” 22 Nov 1964, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • MacLaverty, Bernard. “Jim Scroggy,” no date, four pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • MacLaverty, Bernard. “The choice,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • MacLaverty, Bernard. “The interview,” no date, eight pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • MacLaverty, Bernard. “Wiglaf the viking,” no date, four pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • McEldowney, Eugene. “A voice among the many. Chapter 1,” no date, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • McEldowney, Eugene. “The old man and the young,” no date.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Mitchell, Michael. “The morning went bang,” “Mr. Celebrity,” “Notes on mechanical Christmas cards,” “Prometheus,” “Fisherwoman,” “The cold equations,” “I do no love thee Dr. Snell,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Pakenham, John. “Ecstatic love poem,” “I remember you said,” “January ‘63,” “Can you remember?,” “Two ways of living,” “A warm day June 63,” “Thoughts on a 25th birthday,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Parker, Stewart. “Paddy dies,” “Valediction for Hammy from Hangoveria,” “Inside a home for the old,” “The broken lives,” “Coming out,” “Postscript,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Parker, Stewart. “The casualty meditates upon his journey,” no date, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Parker, Stewart. Untitled prose no date, three pages. (6 untitled prose pieces)

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Parker, Stewart. Untitled poetry no date, two pages. (5 untitled poems)

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Robson, Bryan. “Keats,” “[Untitled],” “Homage à Samuel Beckett,” “Talking of dragons,” “Four poems from a Durham childhood,” “On Slea Head,” no date, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Robson, Bryan. “The great aunts,” “Confession out of term,” “[Untitled],” “Shakespear in drag,” “A fever in summer,” “Mr. S. Beckett at Campbell College,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Scott, Brian. “Untitled ["close close"],” “Untitled ["your body your"],” “Last Night I wrote a poem of Love,” “Untitled ["sun"],” “Because I Have a Pact with the Maker,” “Miracle,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Scott, Brian. “[Untitled],” “University tulips,” “After a disturbance,” “Fragments,” “Blind man,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Simmons, James. “Drinker’s blues,” “Fahan Strand,” “Old lady’s song,” “Ramble away,” “The young airforce men,” “The Ulster soldier boy,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Simmons, James. “Sonnets for the class of 58,” “One man – two voices,” “On gardens,” “At Cordelia’s grave,” “Singing at a coffee party,” “Soliloquy for a ghost,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Smyth, Paul. Untitled short story no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Smyth, Paul. Untitled short story no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Smyth, Paul. Untitled short story no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Stronge, Marilyn. “To and fro,” “Night falls,” “Green-grey to the ocean,” “The sea,” “Hour of light and dark,” “Night falling,” no date, one page.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Sullivan, Ronald. “Extracts from a diary,” no date, three pages. (7 untitled poems)

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Sullivan, Ronald. “Notes on ‘Reflections,” “Image One,” no date, three pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Terry, Arthur. “A small war,” “The appointment,” “The sisters,” “Told after Brueghel,” “Caesar,” no date, three pages. (translations)

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Terry, Arthur. “Beginnings,” “Untitled ["On Sunday evenings in the poor quarter"],” “Time was,” “My skeleton,” no date, two pages. (translations)

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Terry, Arthur. “By natural piety,” no date, one page.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Watton, Joan. “Aunt Alice,” “Spinster,” “The hangover,” “Detachment,” “Maggie,” “Letters from the island,” “Wakening,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Watton, Joan. “Betrayal,” “Gleneyre Children’s Home,” “An old man in a fish shop,” “Worm,” “Nightmare,” “A lone, middle-aged, unmarried woman relates,” “Boyhood memory,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.

  • Watton, Joan. “Requim of a war-baby,” “A fly’s Belsen,” “Without preliminaries,” “The industrials,” “Ian,” “Camp memories,” no date, two pages.

    Source: Belfast Creative Writing Group 1963-6.