A SHORT story from Roddy Doyle will be the inspiration behind this year’s St Patrick’s Festival parade in Dublin on March 17th.
Brilliant, by the Booker-prize winning author, is about banishing the black dog of depression over Dublin and getting the city's sense of humour back.
Pageant and theatrical companies will base their parade entries on different chapters of the story, to mark Dublin’s designation as a Unesco City of Literature.
Roddy Doyle said he jumped at the chance to write a story for the festival and he believed the parade would be “very special”.
Details of the St Patrick’s Festival line-up, released last night, include five days and nights of entertainment.
Wexford will host the National Lottery Skyfest on Saturday, March 19th, when Pains Fireworks will use 1.6 tonnes of fireworks and 6,000 pyrotechnic effects to light up the sky.
The festival will also see the return of events such as the Céilí on St Stephen’s Green on March 16th and the Big Day Out on Merrion Square on Saturday, March 20th. The Crafts Council of Ireland will be marking its Year of Craft by hosting a children’s craft village at the Big Day Out. The council will hold free workshops where children can work with materials such as felt, pottery and paper.
Building on the literary theme will be DublinSwell, at Dublin’s convention centre on March 18th. It will include performances from writers such as Nobel Laureate Séamus Heaney and Sebastian Barry, and musicians Mike Scott and Damien Dempsey. The festival Treasure Hunt on March 19th will also have a literary slant.
Street theatre, funfairs and Gaelspraoi events will be dotted around the city during the five-day festival. Minister for Tourism Mary Hanafin said the festival would showcase “a new, young, modern Ireland” that was “very much alive and well and open for business”.
