ALLEN GINSBERG chatting with Bono, photographer Nutan offering chips to Annie Proulx and Dame Beryl Bainbridge, and the night no one noticed when one writer replaced another due to the “big snow”.
Such moments from Cúirt’s 25-year history are recalled in an exhibition which got the week-long festival under way at Galway Arts Centre yesterday.
For former Cúirt director and current artistic director of Galway Arts Festival Paul Fahy the display of photographs, catalogues and memorabilia reminded him of the “flood of fun” which he had over the years.
Fahy recalled some of his own experiences when running Cúirt – such as the year of the “big snow” which prevented American poet Michael S Harper from travelling. When poet and funeral director Thomas Lynch took his place no one seemed to notice, Fahy said, in spite of the fact the writers had different skin colour – never mind writing technique.
Photographs by Joe O’Shaughnessy record many of the writers who have attended Cúirt, including founder Fred Johnston, Galway poet Rita Ann Higgins, who gave the first festival reading with Ian Crichton-Smith in the Warwick Hotel; Seamus Heaney sharing a moment with Elaine Feinstein; and a very youthful Fintan O’Toole with poet Brendan Kennelly.
Fahy also marked another 25th birthday when he paid tribute to publishers Cló Iar-Chonnachta and founder Micheál Ó Conghaile.
Part of the art centre’s first floor in 47 Dominick Street, former home of Lady Gregory, has been transformed into a Georgian living room for the week of Cúirt, and director Maureen Kennelly said that the festival was very much open for business in spite of flight restrictions.
Writers travelling from North America and Canada are on standby for flights to Ireland, while British participants such as former Granta editor Ian Jack are travelling overland and by sea.
Man Booker prizewinner Anne Enright will appear at the festival’s first reading tonight with Roddy Doyle in place of Mary Gaitskill, but Gaitskill hopes to be in Galway on time for a discussion on the rise of the memoir on Thursday, which will also involve Hugo Hamilton.
Writers Tessa Hadley and Naomi Shihab Nye are unable to travel, but Pat Boran will join Richard Tillinghast and Fred D’Aguiar in place of Shihab Nye tomorrow.
Ms Kennelly said that there had been great support and goodwill from participating writers, and arrangements have been made in case of any further difficulties to provide Skype video-conference links.
Programme and booking details are available from the Town Hall Theatre, Galway, at 091-56977 or tht.ie.
** Hugo Hamilton is due to participate in the sixth annual Heinrich Böll memorial weekend, which will be opened by Minister of State at the Office of Public Works Dr Martin Mansergh on April 30th on Achill island, Co Mayo.
John Banville, James Cruickshank, René Böll, Dr Gisela Holfter, and German Book Prize winner Kathrin Schmidt will also give readings at the Böll weekend in memory of the German writer who spent time on Achill and wrote Irisches Tagebuch (Irish Journal), published in 1957, among many other works.