Boundaries, mediation and redress in the work of Seamus Heaney and Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin

In an essay published in 2018, the composer and educator Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin acknowledged the influence of his mentor John Blacking’s “utopian charge” (2018, 4) - the belief in the potential of art forms to become “forces of cultural mediation” (2018, 1) that may act to redress inequalities in the social and political spheres. Mícheál enthusiastically thus took up the role of cultural mediator, and, inspired by Seamus Heaney’s notions of crossing or bridging knowledges and of passing through boundaries (terminus) (2004, 24), encouraged us to redress imbalances and to listen to voices previously unheard. As the island of Ireland arrives at a new crossroads of rapidly changing politics and demographics, this essay is a personal reflection on the example of Mícheál’s own crossing of boundaries within Ireland North and South, in the Irish diaspora, and further afield. Might Mícheál’s vision of “art as prophetic” (2018, 4) shine a light to show us the way forward?