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Caitriona O’Reilly (born in Dublin in 1973) is an Irish poet and critic. She grew up in Wicklow, and studied English and Archeology at Trinity College, Dublin. She took BA and PhD degrees in Archaeology and English at Trinity College, Dublin, and was awarded the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature for her poetry collection, The Nowhere Birds (2001, Bloodaxe). She is the co-author (with David Wheatley) of a chapbook, Three-Legged Dog (Wild Honey Press, 2002); her second collection, The Sea Cabinet, followed in 2006. Her poetry can also be found in The Wake Forest Irish Poetry Series Vol.1. She is a widely published critic, has written for BBC Radio 4, and has also published some fiction. She was a contributing editor of the Irish poetry journal Metre.
She wrote her Ph.D. on American poetry, specifically Emily Dickinson, H.D., and Sylvia Plath. She has taught at Trinity College, Dublin, St. Patrick’s College, Dublin, and the Dun Laoghaire Institute of Arts and Design.
O’Reilly is on the editorial board of the journal Metre, for which she has written reviews and essays. She has also reviewed for The Irish Times, Poetry Review, and Times Literary Supplement, among others.
Her first collection, The Nowhere Birds (Bloodaxe Press, 2001) won the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature, and her poetry has been included in many anthologies.
She lives in Wicklow.
The Sea Cabinet was shortlisted for The Irish Times Poetry Now Award in 2007.
