Dalkey Creates

An inaugural writing festival for Dalkey

Thursday 16th– Sunday 19th October 2014

Booking online at www.dalkeycreates.com

and at the €3 Bookshop in The Tramyard, Dalkey

The festival is all about creating, and the best part of it all is the opportunity for everyone involved in workshops and classes to perform their work to an audience in Dalkey Town Hall on the last day of the festival. Aside from memoir, creative writing, screenwriting, blogging and song-writing classes with some really super tutors (Ferdia MacAnna, Eleanor McEvoy etc) we have some unusual events like a literary kayaking tour around the Dalkey coastline, and a food writing course which includes a meal at a fab Dalkey restaurant. 

And of course, the Open Mic event which I’m HOPING will be really popular with emerging writers all over – Hazel Gaynor is adjudicating!  

Uniquely, the Festival will be bringing new words to life, providing a platform for writers who want to read or have their work performed in front of a live audience on the final day. One such event will be 'Memory Lane', the culmination of a memoir writing project between local school children and senior Dalkey residents. 

The Festival is also hosting a number of other literary events, including Jennifer Johnston in conversation with Martina Devlin on Friday 17th at Dalkey Castle & Heritage Centre. Our own Maeve Binchy will be celebrated in the production of ‘Scenes from Minding Frankie’ by Shay Linehan on Saturday 18th at 7.30pm also at Dalkey Castle & Heritage Centre.

Booking online at www.dalkeycreates.com

Francis Ledwidge Poetry Award

Deadline: November 5th 

Taking Flight - Menu of Poems

Every year, the Arts in Health organisation commissions a pamphlet of poems. They are for distribution in hospital wards, in waiting rooms, Community and Day Care Centres and other health settings for patients, visitors and staff all over Ireland. They even come with some Meals on Wheels. This year, I curated the pamphlet. I took as my theme, Taking Flight.

In particular I was thinking of how reading a poem can take out of where you are for a short time. How your imagination can take you somewhere else, how sometimes you can even fly.

Bearing in mind the sometimes stressful environment of the readers, I was looking for poems that were not so gloomy, more uplifting. I only had a small amount of space to play with so I had to leave some lovely behind. I could have filled three of four pages with no problem at all.

You can read more about it here and download a copy for yourself or your organisation. Try reading these poems aloud. Try writing your own. And we'd love to get feedback, especially from people who've read them in a health setting.

We're launching on Wednesday 8th October at lunchtime in Naas Hospital.

Romanian Cultural Exchange

To mark the first Romanian Cultural Days festival, the Romanian Cultural Institute in London and the Embassy of Romania in Ireland will host a literary event with Romanian poet Ioan Es Pop and Irish writer and traveller Peter Hurley discussing writing and tradition, preceded by the screening of Dieter Auner's Off the Beaten Track (2010), a chronicle of life in Romania's countryside.

The moderator for the discussion will be Irish Times journalist, Stephen Collins.

All welcome and booking is not required.

Full programme here

Plough Prize

Liz Lochhead, the Scots Makar, will judge the 2014 Plough Prize. 

Deadline: 30 November 2014.

• Entry fee: £5 per poem
• Forty lines or under, no theme

 1^st prize £1,000

2^nd prize £500

3^rd prize £250

Details  and entry forms downloadable from www.theploughprize.co.uk

Bailieborough Poetry Festival

Here's the programme for the Baileborough Festival

Thursday 9 October:
Opening of festival and exhibition of work by artist Róisín Duffy in Bailieborough Library @ 8pm.

Friday 10 October:
Reading by Welsh poet Nerys Williams to mark the centenary of the birth of Dylan Thomas. @8pm
(Murtagh’s Lounge).

Poetry Aloud- open mic night in local pub @10pm.

Saturday 11 October:
Poetry workshop facilitated by Nerys Williams in Bailieborough Library Arts Space @10 – 12 am.

Presentation of Bailieborough Poetry Competition Prizes and reading of short-listed poems in
Bailieborough Library Arts Space @2pm.

Skirmish of the Writing groups @ 5pm (Murtagh’s Lounge).

Evening of poetry starting with local performance poet, Patsy McDermott, followed by a reading by
Iggy McGovern to close the festival @ 8pm (Murtagh’s Lounge).

More details on the website.

Paint to Page - A Poetry Workshop with Enda Coyle-Greene

Horace once wrote that, 'A picture is a poem without words.'

During this workshop, through creatively stimulating writing exercises, close reading of poems that have paintings or photographs as their point of reference, and lively group discussion, we will look at how the two art forms frequently confront and speak to each other.

Participants may also bring along a poem (not necessarily art-related in subject!) with which they would like some gentle, constructive help.

Facilitated by poet Enda Coyle-Greene:

Date: Saturday, October 11th, 2014
Time: 11am to 4pm
Location: United Arts Club, 3 Upper Fitzwilliam Street, Dublin 2.

Cost: €50
(under charging I think)

Lunch & light refreshments included

Link here

Book directly through the Arts Club - phone 01 661 1411