Poetry Now gets a new home – and a new curator
The poet Paul Perry is the new curator of the Poetry Now festival. Part of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council’s arts programme for the past decade and a half, it was for many years a main event in the literary calendar in its own right. Now part of the council’s Mountains to Sea book festival, it will run next year from Friday, August 30th, to Sunday, September 8th.
Perry's collections include The Drowning of the Saints, The Orchid Keeperand The Last Falcon and Small Ordinance, described by Dermot Bolger as the work of a singular imagination. He teaches creative writing across the water, at Kingston University in London, and as writer fellow at University College Dublin.
Young Irish novelist scoops £10,000 prize
A young Dubliner, Simon Ashe-Browne, has won a £10,000 prize for unpublished writers. Dundee International Book Prize, which includes the publication of his book, is offered by the Scottish city's university and council and by a Glasgow-based publisher, Cargo. The book, Nothing Human Left, which is out now, is a psychological thriller set at a Dublin school. The 26-year-old, who has been scribbling away since he was eight, beat more than 100 entries from around the globe.
Green ink: Irish graphic novels up for discussion
The big increase in graphic novels and comic books by Irish creators or on Irish themes is the focus of a half-day seminar, Green Inking, at the National Library of Ireland today, from 10am to 1pm. It's first come first served, and at just €5 it's bound to be packed, given the explosion of interest in the genre. In the chair is the children's author and artist Oisín McGann, who will be joined by the Spanish graphic artist Luis Bustos, creator of Endurance, chronicling the voyage of Ernest Shackleton; Rob Curley of SubCity and Atomic Diner; Tomm Moore of Cartoon Saloon; and the illustrator, animator and printmaker Cliodhna Lyons. SubCity will have a pop-up shop at the library today.
Call for entries for Gregory O’Donoghue poetry prize
There's a first prize of €1,000 in the third Gregory O'Donoghue International Poetry Competition, the deadline for entries of which is December 18th. Second prize is €500, 3rd €250. All prizewinners, and work by 10 other commended poets, will have their poems published in Southword, of which O'Donoghue, whom the prize commemorates, was poetry editor. The winner will read his or her winning poem at the Cork Spring Literary Festival in February.
O’Donoghue (1951-2005) was part of the glittering generation who studied English at University College Cork under Sean Lucy and John Montague. Theo Dorgan, Maurice Riordan, Gerry Murphy, Thomas McCarthy and Séan Dunne also basked in that wonderful era. O’Donoghue died unexpectedly, his last collection, Ghost Dance (Dedalus), being published posthumously, in 2006.
Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill, Greg Delanty, Paddy Bush, Kerry Hardie, Fiona Sampson, Katie Donovan, Gregory Orr and Neil Astley are all in the festival line-up, as are poets from Canada, Croatia, Italy, Slovenia, New Zealand, Britain and the US. You’ll find competition details at munsterlit.ie.
Not such a long long way to Tipperary for Barry
Down in Tipperary, avid readers have been working their way through Sebastian Barry's A Long Long Waybefore his visit to libraries in the county, next weekend, as part of this year's Tipperary Reads festival. His book was the most-borrowed title in the county's libraries during July and August. John Banville, Joseph O'Connor and Tipperary native Frank Delaney have participated in the past.
