nobel laureate seamus heaney is acknowledged to have been influenced by kavanagh. heaney was introduced to kavanagh's work by the writer michael mclaverty when they taught together at st thomas's, belfast. heaney and kavanagh shares a belief in the capacity of the local, or parochial, to reveal the universal. heaney once said that kavanagh's poetry "had a transformative effect on the general culture and liberated the gifts of the poetic generations who came after him." heaney noted: "kavanagh is a truly representative modern figure in that his subversiveness was turned upon himself: dissatisfaction, both spiritual and artistic, is what inspired his growth... his instruction and example helped us to see an essential difference between what he called the parochial and provincial mentalities". as kavanagh put it: "all great civilizations are based on the parish". he concludes that kavanagh's poetry vindicates his "indomitable faith in himself and in the art that made him so much more than himself".