Donoghue was born at
Tullow,
County Carlow, into a
Roman Catholic family, the youngest of four surviving children. He was brought up in
Warrenpoint,
County Down,
Northern Ireland, where his father, Denis, was sergeant-in-charge of the
Royal Ulster Constabulary. His mother was Johanna (O'Neill) Donoghue. He was educated by the
Irish Christian Brothers at the
Abbey Christian Brothers' Grammar School, Newry. He stood 6'7". He studied
Latin and English at
University College Dublin (UCD), earning a bachelor of arts degree in 1949, an M.A. in 1952, a Ph.D. in 1957, and a D.Litt. (honoris causa) in 1989. He then studied
Lieder singing at the
Royal Irish Academy of Music. He earned an M.A. at the
University of Cambridge in 1964, and returned to Dublin, becoming a professor at UCD. In 1980, he was appointed to the
Henry James chair of English and American letters at NYU, his final teaching post. He married Frances Rutledge, formerly a teacher and flight attendant, on 1 December 1951. The couple had eight children. One,
Emma Donoghue (born 1969), is an Irish-Canadian novelist, literary historian, teacher, playwright, and radio/film scriptwriter. They resided together in
Durham, North Carolina, until Denis Donoghue's death at age 92 on 6 April 2021 from natural causes. His first wife, Frances, predeceased him in 2018. He is survived by his second wife Melissa, his children (David, Helen, Hugh, Celia, Mark, Barbara, Stella and Emma), and a large extended family. ==Works==