FABER ACADEMY IN DUBLIN

PHOTOGRAPH BY ÓRFHLAITH FOYLE


The Faber Academy is coming to Dublin in April next year. Gerard Donovan and Claire Keegan will teach a course called 'The Art of the Short Story' at Newman House on Thursday 16 to Sunday 19 April 2009.

The blurb rather cryptically states: 'How to Create More Room Using Less Space: How to create more room in a small apartment? Make the walls into mirrors, get rid of half the furniture, and render yourself invisible.' I mean, I know what they are getting at, but why be so weirdly obscure? Anyhow...

The course costs a pretty €630, is set over four days and the teachers will 'explore how to transform everyday experience from statements into suggestion that is both intellectually and emotionally significant. Using discussions and exercises, the workshops will address the elements of the form - among them setting, characters, time, structure and how fiction forms a temporal arc - while pondering how short story writers use detail, and the lack of it, to cast the spell of that single effect.'

Claire is a great teacher, I know from experience, and Gerard is a fine writer, so all in all I'm sure it will be a fabulous few days. Expect to learn loads.

See the Faber site here for more.

CRANNÓG 19 LAUNCH

I read a story, 'As I Look', at the launch of Crannóg 19 - a Canadian special - in Galway city on Friday, along with fellow contributors Sandra Bunting, Mary Rose Callan and Celeste Augé. There was a simultaneous launch in Canada at the Atelier Circulaire in Montreal. My story has nothing to do with Canada but was inspired by the surrealist paintings at the Tate Modern in London. A pdf of the current issue will go live on the Crannóg website shortly, if past trends are followed.

Tony O'Dwyer of the editorial board, and also publisher with Words on The Street, MC'ed the night. Pete Mullineaux provided an interactive music experience. Words On The Street had had a very successful launch the previous evening of Alan McMonagle's début fiction collection Liar, Liar. The title story of which I chose for Southword earlier this year. It's a small literary world! Also at the launch were writers Gerardine Burke, Órfhlaith Foyle and Patricia Burke-Brogan.

Crannóg is a Galway-based literary magazine that has been going since 2002 and is improving year on year, in looks and in content. You can see their subs guides here.

IRISH TED HUGHES WINNERS

PHOTO FROM THE EVENING COURIER

This is a really cute, feel-good story.

Two little Irish brothers, Dualtagh and Hugo Grundy, who now live in Yorkshire, were joint first prize winners in the Ted Hughes Young Poets' Award, adjudicated by UK Poet Laureate Andrew Motion.

They were on the News the other night with their Mom, Siobhán, and their three little brothers, one of whom is called Atticus. Atticus Grundy! The cuteness of it!

Hugo, six, wrote 'A Town of Trees'. He said: "I got the idea from a book I'm reading called The Hobbit." He's six years old and reading Tolkien!

Dualtagh, who is seven, wrote 'Picking Bilberries'. "I was inspired to write it when I went walking in Cragg Vale," he said. "I would like to be a poet when I grow up." I betcha he will be, too.

Andrew Motion said, "I have never read such amazingly good poems. They are so attentive to the world. They have alive ears."

Articles here and here.

MSLEXIA WOMEN'S SHORT STORY COMP

Here's a good one: Mslexia magazine are now running a short fiction comp for women writers. Presumably because of the success of their poetry competition.

The prize money is great: £2,000 for first, plus a one week stay at Chawton House Library. I know I've retired from comps, but as I once again did not get an Arts Council Bursary, and another Fellowship I went for was not to be mine, it is becoming increasingly difficult to think of ways to earn money. So, I'm going to enter. (Maybe my retirement should be from the smaller Irish competitions only?)

Anyway, so far, the Mslexians have never liked anything I've sent them, so I probably haven't a snowball's chance, but it's worth a wee try, methinks.

Word count: 2200

Closing date: 23rd January 2009

Entry fee: £8 stg

Judge: Helen Simpson

See Mslexia's website here.

EVERY DAY FICTION

I have a story at Every Day Fiction here. It's called 'Roy Lichtenstein's Nudes In A Mirror: We Are Not Fake!'. The fadas (accents) in my name appear as apostrophes, which looks kind of bizarre...

Every Day Fiction is a magazine that specializes in publishing fiction in bite-size doses. Every day, they publish a new short story of 1000 words or fewer. Readers can leave comments on whether they like a story or not.

So they need between 28 and 31 stories a month. That's a lot of short stories! Submit here.

CUISLE POETRY FESTIVAL 2008

I was in Limerick at the week-end for the Cuisle Poetry Festival; I was one of the judges for their Young Poet of the Year children’s poetry competition and the awards ceremony took place on Saturday in Daghda’s lovely converted church in John’s Square. They read; I handed out silver cups; and Bertha O’Callaghan – who instigated the competition last year – was mistress of ceremonies.

The children of Ireland write about many and various things including crocodiles, chocolate, butterflies, deceased grandparents, unrequited love, war, drinking, rivers, trees, pregnancy, shampoo, poverty, Ryanair and mining. The standard was incredible and it was great to meet all the young poets and see how happy it made them for their writing to be acknowledged.

We made it to the Salmon launch of Caroline Lynch’s and Pete Mullineaux’s new collections. I am familiar with Pete’s work from years of hearing him read in Galway and he didn’t disappoint. Caroline is brand new to me and she read wonderfully from her slim book Lost in the Gaeltacht. Her poem 'Our Dead Grandmothers' was particularly striking in its gleeful and morbid honesty; she also read a new and very effective pantoum about death and marriage. She is a poet to watch, for sure.

The only other writer we heard read was Neil Rollinson from England. He delivered a rakish set of poems about his twin obsessions: sex and horses. No poem was about both, I hasten to point out. He’s a great reader and his poem about seeing all his potential wives on the Tube had poet Ciarán O’Driscoll, and many others, in convulsions.

In a happy addition to a great week-end, I picked up the newest Stony Thursday Book to buy and found I had three poems in it! I never had heard back about my submission so presumed it was a PFO, but there I am, nestled between Gerry Murphy (my ‘conduit’!) and Mary Noonan. Nice one!

MARKS AND BUZZ

I arrived back after my trip to Dublin for the Marks launch to a big, fat envelope stuffed with a generous 10 copies of the Buzz anthology from Templar Poetry in the UK. It is a gorgeous production and I am delighted to have three poems included. Fellow Galway writer Maureen Gallagher is also featured. I read half of it last night and the standard is amazing. I can only imagine that the winners of the pamphlet competition were outstanding. One of them was Siobhán Campbell, a well-known and exciting poet. I heard her read at Cúirt a few years ago and one of her poems, about a girl's sexuality being formed by her father's pornography stash, was alarmingly frank and taut.

Copies of Buzz can be bought here for £8 sterling. My pals will be getting a copy for Christmas from my contributor's pile! If anyone wants to review it, contact me through my website or, indeed, go straight to Templar Poetry.

The Marks launch was a blast: a big crowd turned up to drink bottles of Miller and swelter in the studio in Temple Bar Gallery where it took place. Circa did such a good job of the publication: it looks beautiful. Alan Jude Moore, Kevin Barry and myself read

Kevin's piece was about a famous Irish sculpture, the Anna Livia Fountain (nicknamed The Floozy in the Jacuzzi), which was inexplicably moved from its spot on O'Connell St in Dublin several years ago and is now in storage. His monologue was raucous and funny: pure Kevin. I loved his silver and gold runners too - very snazzy!

I met the lovely film-maker Paddy Cahill and his equally lovely brother Conor. Watch out for Paddy's excellent documentary on Liberty Hall which will be shown on RTÉ in the coming months. Also at the launch were writer and blogger P.J. Nolan, writers Kathleen Murray and Sinéad Morrissey, and artists Cora Cummins and Seán Lynch.

It was a great night and all credit goes to Declan Meade of The Stinging Fly and Peter Fitzgerald of Circa. Marks is available to purchase for a bargain €6 here.

June Levine R.I.P.

I was sad to hear of the sudden death yesterday of Dublin writer June Levine. June was a novelist, journalist and feminist and she wrote Sisters, about the feminist movement in Ireland; A Season of Weddings (novel) and Lyn, with prostitute Lyn Madden. The latter was one of those books that we whispered about in school: 'Have you read it?'

I have huge admiration for the women who went on the 'Contraceptive Train' to Northern Ireland in 1971 (when I was an oblivious one-year-old) to bring back condoms for the women of the Republic, where they were banned. They had guts and grit. Rest in peace, June. Like that other great Dublin woman and writer who passed away this year, Nuala Ó Faoláin, you will be missed.

SHORT REVIEW 12 - OUT NOW!

Issue 12 of The Short Review is out now and is, as usual, packed full of goodies. It includes a concise and informative interview with Yannick Murphy. I always thought Yannick was a man. Well, I was wrong. Read her interview here and see her site here.

IWC EVENTS OCTOBER

There are some great readings and events taking place at the Irish Writers' Centre in Dublin this October including:

10th October: Out to Lunch – John F. Deane – 1.15 p.m.

21st October: Hourglass Reading – Anne Enright – 7 p.m.

24th October: Out to Lunch – Philip Casey – 1.15 p.m.

28th October: Into Print – literay agent Jonathan Williams – 7 p.m.

For more info see the IWC website here.

'MARKS' LAUNCH - ALL WELCOME!

One of the two collaborative projects I mentioned I was involved with earlier this year. Cora and I did our piece on the soon-to-be-demolished, iconic Dublin building Liberty Hall. Our four page spread includes poems, etchings and photographs.

Marks, a joint publication from The Stinging Fly literary magazine, and Circa, the visual art magazine, will be launched on the 15th of October.

Earlier this year, the two magazines came together to pair six writers and six artists, giving them the brief to fill four magazine pages with whatever they wished, through a collaborative exploration of the possibilities.

The pairings are:

Caitríona O'Reilly (writer) and Isabel Nolan (artist)

Kevin Barry (writer) and Seán Lynch (artist)

Nuala Ní Chonchúir (writer) and Cora Cummins (artist)

Alan Jude Moore (writer) and Bea McMahon (artist)

Sinéad Morrissey (writer) and Benji de Búrca (artist)

Seán O'Reilly (writer) and Peter Maybury (artist).

Marks will be launched next Wednesday October 15th at Studio 6 of Temple Bar Gallery and Studios, Temple Bar, Dublin 2. The event runs from 6pm to 8ish and will feature readings by Kevin Barry and Nuala Ní Chonchúir, and sound work by Peter Maybury.

Admission is free. All are welcome.

A free copy of Marks is going to all subscribers of either publication... another good reason to subscribe... otherwise a limited number of copies will be available at €6 each.

GLEN DIMPLEX AWARD SHORTLIST

The 2008 Glen Dimplex New Writers Awards have announced their shortlists in five different categories: Fiction, Poetry, Children's, Irish language and Non-fiction/Biography. Congrats to all the shortlistees.

There's a total prize fund of €45,000, and the award is for a writer's first ever book (not their first in a given genre).

The fiction shortlist is as follows:

Allan Bush - Last Bird Singing - Seren

Aifric Campbell - The Semantics of Murder - Profile Books

Daniel Davies - The Isle of Dogs - Serpent’s Tail

Rowan Somerville - The End of Sleep - Orion Publishing (Check out Rowan's website here. It's quite mad!)

David Szalay - London and The South-East - Random House Group Ltd

Robin Yassin-Kassab - The Road from Damascus - Hamish Hamilton


And the poetry list, which includes three collections from Salt - big congratulations to them!


Paul Batchelor - The Sinking Road - Bloodaxe Books Ltd

Ciaran Berry - The Sphere of Birds - The Gallery Press

Valeria Melchioretto - The End of Limbo - Salt Publishing

Eleanor Rees - Andvaste's Hair - Salt Publishing

Kathryn Simmonds - Sunday at the Skin Launderette - Seren

Will Stone - Glaciation - Salt Publishing

The other shortlists can be found here: Glen Dimplex 2008

FRANK O’CONNOR FESTIVAL 2008 #2

MARY O'DONNELL, CORK 2008

I owe it to the other writers I heard at the festival to make some attempt to finish the posting about the FOC 2008, I feel. I’m finding it hard to sit at the computer for long with my sore neck but I’ll try, however briefly, to report on the rest of the fest.

Rachel Trezise is an extraordinary Welsh writer – billed in the programme as a ‘young Welsh iconoclast’, which she is. I heard her read at the FOC in 2005 and bought her collection Fresh Apples then. Her stories are raw, modern and packed with truth, and she didn’t disappoint again with a story called ‘But Not Really’. Rachel is a casual and convincing reader and the story she read is about a woman called Jackie whose father is also her Sugar Daddy. Jackie lives in a Welsh valley where ‘poverty surrounded you like a neck brace’. This is authentic, bang-up-to-the-minute short fiction, beautifully read. Am I the only one who could listen to the Welsh accent 24 hours a day?

The regal Mary O’Donnell read on the same bill with Rachel; the title piece from her new, FOC longlisted collection Storm Over Belfast The story is about an Irish language teacher who drives to Belfast to visit Lettie, his ex-girlfriend. Lettie’s mental health is suffering and she has let herself go, and soon her ex- can’t wait to get away from her. It’s a poignant story and Mary delivered it gorgeously, complete with a Belfast accented Lettie.

Mary Leland read a very moving story about the death of a husband; many audience members were wiping at their eyes. It was a pleasure to hear Mary read, never having done so before. I think we need a Mary Leland revival.

Wena Poon, an FOC longlistee from California via Singapore, gave an animated reading of her story ‘Addiction’, about a gay Singaporean student in England, who is trying to perfect his English accent. The story concerns his parents’ high expectations and his own burgeoning desires. Wena acted much of the story, which seems to have been a bit of a theme over the festival’s readings.

Julie Orringer, the current writer in residence at New York Public Library read a shocker of a story about the cruelty of children called ‘Pilgrims’. We were left collectively gasping. She is a very impressive writer and woman: stylish, calm and honest.

Bernard McLaverty of these shores has published an impressive five collections of short fiction; that must be about the most by any Irish living writer? He mentioned three writers who made him want to write: Frank O’Connor, Michael McLaverty and Hemingway. He read a story about a man visiting a diabetes clinic which people found very funny.

OK, my neck is stating to unhinge so that’s it for now...