Callanan studied for Catholic priesthood at Maynooth College, and afterwards law at Trinity College, Dublin, where he won two prizes for his poems. Afterward, he found employment teaching briefly at a school in his hometown of Cork.
Callanan also contributed translations of Irish verse to Blackwood's Magazine before traveling to Lisbon to work as a tutor in 1827. Jeremiah Callanan died in Lisbon in 1829, as he was preparing to return to Ireland.
Famous poem
"The Outlaw of Loch Lene," Callanan's most well-known poem, begins with the line, "O MANY a day have I made good ale . . . ."
