Acclaimed Mayo poet launches her debut collection
Acclaimed poet Christina Hennemann releases her highly anticipated debut collection Birthmark (Shearsman Books), a powerful exploration of growing up, becoming, and belonging that charts the complex terrain between personal history and collective memory.
In this notable debut, Hennemann demonstrates the keen ecological awareness and lyrical precision that have earned her recognition from Arts Council Ireland and multiple literary awards.
Her poems traverse vivid landscapes from both her German roots and Irish home, exploring the intersections of gender, class, and sexuality against the backdrop of intergenerational trauma.
Birthmark showcases Hennemann’s distinctive voice as she weaves personal history with ancient mythologies and archetypes into poems with a vatic and haunting nature.
Her work reveals a playful approach to bilingualism and wordplay, as in ‘Hades Gothic’: ‘Eye hear you, every woman is an eyeland, my I's fixed on the upturned earth.’
Her feminist-psychoanalytic lens brings sharp focus to the personal and political dimensions of growing up in a dysfunctional family amid global upheaval.
The collection has garnered exceptional praise from leading literary voices.
Patrick Cotter notes that ‘Christina Hennemann presents here a collection densely interwoven with meaning and experience.
She percolates childhood, girlhood, womanhood through a personal mythology inventive and original; with language cadent, elegant and sonically sparkling.’ Sophie Dumont praises how ‘Christina Hennemann’s Birthmark pulses with warmth and daring … part mirror, part blade – a knife passed down through generations.’
Hennemann will celebrate the collection’s launch on November 15 at The Winding Stair, Dublin, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m.
The free event, open to all, will be launched by Damien Donnelly and feature four guest readers: Alicia Byrne Keane, Derval Tubridy, Eoin Cahill and Sinead McClure.
Hennemann’s impressive literary credentials include winning the Cerasus Poetry Chapbook Competition for Leafing (2024) and publishing Witch/Womb (Book Hub, 2024).
Her work has been funded with an Agility Award from Arts Council Ireland, and she has received the Luain Press Poetry Prize, a Diana Woods Memorial Award in Creative Nonfiction, and a Mayo Artist Bursary.
Until recently based in Ballina, she is part of the local artist collective the NCF.
Birthmark is available through Shearsman Books’ website, Amazon, and signed copies directly from the author.