Seamus Heaney Visitor Center to Open With Help From His Family

BBC News reports that a new visitors' center dedicated to the life and memory of Seamus Heaney is due to open in September, built on the site of a former police station in Bellaghy in County Londonderry, where the poet grew up and is buried. The £4 million Seamus Heaney HomePlace centre has had help from Heamus's family members right from the start.

His family have donated a number of his books and belongings to the centre.

They attended an event on Monday to mark the final stage of construction as the fit-out of the internal spaces begins.

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The centre will include a theatre, cafe, community space and exhibitions about the literary giant's life and work.

It will also have a recreation of Seamus Heaney's attic study in his Dublin home.

His son Chris said they wanted to give an idea of the range of reading his father did.

"There's obviously some poetry books," he said, "but there's also fiction, art books, biography."

"We also want to give people a feel of what his study was like, so we've donated things that were on his desk, some posters, just some artefacts to give a bigger picture of the writing life."

HomePlace is being run by Mid-Ulster District Council, and the centre's manager Brian McCormick is Seamus Heaney's nephew.

"We've set ourselves a target of 35,000 visitors per year," he said.

"While it's a rural area we're obviously positioned almost halfway between Belfast and Derry.

"Actually, in recent discussions with Father Dolan, who is the parish priest, he has indicated that people already travel to visit Seamus Heaney's grave and sign the visitors book there.

Read on at BBC News.