The present study seeks to pursue the philosophy of active nihilism in Seamus Heaney’s collections of poetry. The main items of active nihilism, which will be explored in the collections, are empty space, nothingness, ontological nihilism, nihilistic phenomenology, religious nihilism, and the historical consideration of nihilism. The investigated collections are Seeing Things (1991), The Spirit Level (1996), Electric Light (2001), District and Circle (2006) and Human Chain (2010). Active nihilism, by accepting no meanings and values as predetermined principles, strives to discover innovative connotations in previous origins and sources. Selected collections of Heaney in this thesis convey examples of absences that will present the fertile presences. Active nihilism, in opposition to radical traditional nihilism, struggles to open possible paths and potentialities for religions to exist safely. In this sort of nihilism, life is, correspondingly, out of imposed meanings, as well as filled with effective individual values. Nothingness, as an item of active nihilism, in Heaney’s poetry, creates meaningful spaces to obtain new meanings. History, one of the critical elements, breeds personal interpretations based upon particular generations. Phenomenology aids active nihilism to specialize every cultural or religious code to a specific phenomenon. Thus, no determined or infallible constitution of belief and credence may be existent. Seamus Heaney, by passing national and religious predispositions, in the last years of his life, cross the threshold of universality of active nihilism.
