Aspects Irish Literature Festival 2011

Aspects 2011 – the premier Irish Literature Festival in Northern Ireland, this year takes place from 21-25 September in North Down Museum and surrounding area.
Highlights include:
Wednesday 21 September, 6.00pm Lucy Caldwell Long Gallery , North Down Museum Aspects is pleased to welcome rising star Lucy Caldwell, for the first time to the Festival. Lucy Caldwell was born in Belfast in 1981 and is an award-winning novelist and playwright. Her first novel, Where They Were Missed was written whilst still at university. Her third novel, The Meeting Point, is a passionate, sensitive exploration of the lies that make family life possible and the compromises contained in every expression of love. The book was recently featured on BBC Radio 4’s Book at Bedtime. Lucy Caldwell will be hosted by Marie-Louise Muir. Wednesday 21 September, 7.00pm Council Chamber, Town Hall Jennifer Johnston was a guest at the very first Aspects Festival. One of Ireland’s most respected and renowned novelists, she has over the course of a staggering 40 years written some of the most memorable and loved novels of our time. We are honoured she is returning the festival. Born in Dublin, she is a novelist and a dramatist, her most recent novel being Truth or Fiction, published in 2009 by Headline Review. Foolish Mortals (2007) was voted Irish Book of the Decade in 2010. She has received many awards: the 1979 Whitbread Award for The Old Jest and Shadows on our Skin (1977) was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. She was short-listed for the Daily Express Best Book of the Year 1992 for The Invisible Worm. The Irish Independent has called her ‘one of Ireland’s finest writers’. Thursday 22 September, 3.00pm Medbh McGuckian Poetry In The Walled Garden Join us for a special event in the beautiful Walled Garden. The Ward family designed the Castle Park Walled Garden in the 1840s. It was never open to the public and was considered by many as a secret garden! Council began restoring the Garden 3 years ago and opened as a visitor attraction in April 2009. The 1.5 acre site has four distinct sections - the kitchen garden, the herb and topiary garden, the swamp garden and the flower garden. It boasts two unique pieces of sculpture inspired by North Down’s maritime history. Seating throughout the garden make it the perfect place to relax and enjoy a few moments peace and quiet and this afternoon to hear the spectacular poetry of Medbh McGuckian. Medbh McGuckian was born in 1950 in Belfast where she lives with her family. She has been Writer-in-Residence at Queen’s University, Belfast, the University of Ulster, Coleraine, and Trinity College, Dublin, and Visiting Fellow at the University of California, Berkeley. Among the prizes she has won are England’s National Poetry Competition, The Cheltenham Award, The Rooney Prize, the Bass Ireland Award for Literature, the Denis Devlin Award, and, in 2002, The Forward Prize for Best Poem. She received the American Ireland Fund Literary Award in 1998. Thursday 22 and Friday 23 September, 6.00pm Poetry at the Boathouse Restaurant Malachi O’Doherty Malachi O’Doherty is a journalist, author and broadcaster. He is the producer and presenter of the audio blog Arts Talk. He provides political and social commentary for BBC NI’s Hearts and Minds programme, and reports frequently for BBC Radio Ulster’s Sunday Sequence. His political journalism has been published in many Irish and British newspapers and periodicals, including The Irish Times, The Guardian, The Sunday Times, The Observer, The Scotsman and The New Statesman. Former Managing Editor of Fortnight magazine, he writes most frequently now in the Belfast Telegraph. He is the author of five books including Empty Pulpits: Ireland’s Retreat From Religion (Gill and Macmillan, 2008) and the memoir Under His Roof (Summer Palace Press, 2009). Maureen Boyle Maureen Boyle was born and raised in Sion Mills, County Tyrone. Her poems have been published widely. She won the Strokestown International Poetry Competition in 2007. In the same year she was the recipient of the Ireland Chair of Poetry Prize for an emergening poet. Come along and enjoy 25% off your meal at the Boathouse Restaurant and while away an hour listening to poetry. Thursday 22 September, 7.00pm Writing with an Edge: Blake Morrison and Nick Laird The Castle Garden Room, North Down Museum Join us for two versatile and engaging writers and speakers. Nick Laird is a lawyer, poet, novelist and critic from Northern Ireland. His essays, reviews and poems have appeared in various journals in Britain and America, including The London Review of Books, The Times Literary Supplement. His debut collection of poetry, To A Fault, and his first novel, Utterly Monkey, were published in 2005. To A Fault was shortlisted for the 2005 Forward Poetry Prize for Best First Collection, and Utterly Monkey for a 2006 Commonwealth Writers Prize. Nick Laird’s second collection of poetry is On Purpose (2007), winner of a 2008 Somerset Maugham Award and the 2009 Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize. His second novel, Glover’s Mistake, was published in 2009. He is an adjunct Professor at New York University. ‘Nick Laird’s writing is deft, good-humoured and absorbing.’ -- Frank McCourt Born in Skipton, Blake Morrison is the author of two best-selling memoirs, And When Did You Last See Your Father and Things My Mother Never Told Me, two novels and a study of the Bulger case, As If. Anyone know if Nick Laird looks like his publicity poster in real life? Thursday 22 September, 9.00pm Colin Bateman’s Crime Night presents Ian Rankin Festival Marquee Join us for another Aspects First and something we hope will become an annual fixture at Aspects. Aspects presents Scottish crime writer and best-seller Ian Rankin in an interview and discussion with our very own Colin Bateman. Ian Rankin is the UK’s number one best-selling crime writer. He lives in Edinburgh, and writes about the city in his award-winning ‘Inspector Rebus’ novels. The books have twice been dramatised for television (starring John Hannah and Ken Stott respectively), and are translated into 36 languages. Ian Rankin also appears regularly on television, notably as a reviewer on BBC2’s ‘Newsnight Review’. mega cool! Saturday 24 September, 7.00pm Leanne O’Sullivan and Dermot Healy Castle Garden Room, North Down Museum What a year Leanne O’Sullivan has had: she has won the Rooney Prize for Literature and the O’Shaunnessy Prize, a truly remarkable achievement at such a young age. Leanne O’Sullivan was born in 1983, and comes from the Beara peninsula in West Cork. She received an MA in English from University College, Cork in 2006. The winner of several of Ireland’s poetry competitions, including the Seacat, Davoren Hanna and RTE Rattlebag Poetry Slam, she has published two collections, both from Bloodaxe, Waiting for My Clothes (2004) and Cailleach: The Hag of Beara (2009). Her work has been included in various anthologies, including Selina Guinness’s The New Irish Poets (Bloodaxe Books, 2004) and Billy Collins’s Poetry 180: A Turning Back to Poetry (Random House, 2003). ‘O’Sullivan’s voice sounds with striking confidence and originality…These are poems not just of what it is to be young…but of what it is to be alive; vividly, vibrantly, vulnerably so’ — Irish Times. Novelist, poet, dramatist, Dermot Healy has been described by Roddy Doyle as ‘Ireland’s greatest living writer’. Now, the celebrated author of A Goat’s Song, The Bend for Home and Sudden Times returns with two new books, Long Time, No See, a lyrical coming-of- age novel set in contemporary Ireland and a brilliant new book of poetry A Fool’s Errand which sees him in illuminating form. Hosted by Nigel McLoughlin. Sunday 25 September, 7.00pm Over to You! Kevin Barry and Moyra Donaldson Vin Café Kevin Barry won the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature in 2007. He was born in Limerick in 1969 and now lives in Dublin. Following his 2007 Rooney Prize winning story There Are Little Kingdoms, Kevin Barry’s first novel, City Of Bohane - arrives with great praise: “a writer of truly extraordinary gifts” (Joseph O’Connor): “hilarious and unpredictable” (Roddy Doyle); “destined to be a true literary star” (Irvine Welsh). Moyra Donaldson, born in Newtownards in 1956, and educated at Queen’s University, Belfast, Moyra Donaldson has matured into one of the country’s most distinctive and accomplished writers. Moyra Donaldson’s poetry, short fiction and playwriting have garnered many prizes and much critical acclaim. Snakeskin Stilettos was reprinted in America in 2002 by CavanKerry, bringing her poetry to the attention of an international audience. A poet who weaves ancient lore into the fabric of contemporary life, her work hearkens back, as fellow poet Mebdh McGuckian notes in the foreword to the CavanKerry edition, to the sensual spirituality of Yeats, while simultaneously looking clearly and wryly at everyday experience. In the much ploughed field of ‘Irish’ poetry, Donaldson’s is a honed and highly relevant voice. Over To You…An open mic session hosted by Malachi O’Doherty Join us for the last event at Aspects 2011 and come and read from your own work. It’s Over to You….It’s a chance for anyone and everyone to perform their own work, poetry, prose, stand up – it’s all fair game and you’ve only got a few minutes to convince your audience! It’s not only performers who enjoy this fun night out – come along and bring your friends. Phone or email by September 20 to put your name In the hat. A limited number of people can perform.