Arts Council Bursaries

Who got the literature ones this time around?
Dated 19th October

Applicant Amount awarded 2007 € Amount awarded 2008 € Amount awarded 2009 €
Kevin Barry €12,500. THis short story writer was also awarded the 2007 Rooney Prize
for Irish Literature on Oct 10th so he's having a good fortnight. See stinging Fly for details on his collection There Are Little Kingdoms which has been recommended to me but I have yet to read.

Rose Doyle €10,000 Novelist, mostly fairly light. See this link. I didn't rate the one book I read by her but I'd give her another chance.

Ann-Marie Hourihane € 9,000 The insightful journalist. I wonder what project she's using this for.

Catherine Mac Carthy € 7,500 € 7,500 The poet gets cash for two years. She also has a novel from 2003. Wonder if it made more money than her poetry?

Martin Malone € 7,500 Kildare based writer. Try his novel called US (as in we, not United States) He was longlisted for the IMPAC for his novel The Broken Cedar.

Alan McMonagle € 3,500 An emerging Galwegian writer.

Judith Mok € 9,000 The writing opera singer. Don't rate her stuff myself.

Paul Perry € 7,500 € 7,500 €10,000 won the Hennessey in 1998 when he was about 7 (young anyway) He has a great biog here but I'd never heard of him before.

John Staples € 3,500 Who?

Dolores Stewart €10,000 €10,000 €15,000 a bilingual poet.

Total €80,000
I'm going to apply for this next time around.

Sleeping with Seamus

A piece in an occasional series of pieces not taken by Sunday Miscellany.

I had that dream again. You know the one. Everyone has it from time to time. No, not the naked one, but the one where the man at the front of the room says the seven most spine-chilling words in the English language. And there’s nothing you can do. It’s too late.

Exams. They bear no resemblance to real life outside of school and yet they are the be-all and end-all of the whole educational conveyor belt. Fail and you plummet, screaming off the end. Do well and the world’s your oyster, or, as my mother said, the world’s your lobster. I had never seen a lobster in real life so I had no idea if they were worth all the toil and brainache.

“The world’s my lobster. The world’s my lobster.” Each word a beat on the pedal downstroke as I biked to school. The weather that morning was truly dreadful for the first day of exams; it was hot and sunny. The smell of cut grass mingled with diesel from the corporation lawnmower on the playing fields. I checked my watch, the leather strap an unfamiliar restriction on my sweaty wrist. I still had plenty of time.

I slung my bike in the hedge and climbed over the gate. The field had been in full sunlight for hours and the grass was warm to the touch. I lay down and reached inside my bag to pull out my poetry textbook. It fell open at a poem by Seamus Heaney called ‘Follower’. The mower droned beyond the goalposts around the far corner of the pitch. I read the poem out loud, rounding the vowels and emphasising the rhythm as my teacher did.

I shut my eyes and imagined the picture he painted, rustic and earthy and a long way from where I was. I took a polo mint out of my pocket and sucked it to try and quell my jumpy stomach. The Weetabix I hadn’t wanted lay heavy. I hadn’t felt hungry but I had been too tired from a restless night to argue with my mother who knew best. I breathed in and out, slowly and deeply. The sun was hot on the back of my knees. I brushed a fly off my arm and made a pillow of soft grass cuttings. The tension in my shoulders eased a little. I moved my head slowly from side to side before resting it on the ground.

Then I was behind the horse-plough, following my father’s striding boots, the furrows stretching endlessly away. I strained to keep up. My legs were aching, my knees weakening. The slap of his reins resonated in my ears. I slipped in his muddy bootprint and woke up.

The lawnmower skimmed past my open book, showering me with cuttings and headed away again. Startled, I leapt to my feet, checking my watch. Only five minutes lost.
I said a silent prayer of thanks for waking and climbed back over the gate. As I straddled my bike, I prayed again that Seamus would come up on the paper. I lobstered up the hill to the hall full of desks and the man waiting to say those seven words, “You may now turn over your paper.”

Stinging Fly short stories

The Stinging Fly Press is seeking submissions of short stories for a new anthology to be published in summer 2008. Last year's anthology These Are Our Lives is still available nad highly recommended (though there are a few duff stories) It featured twenty-two stories.

Post submissions to: PO Box 6016, Dublin 8.

No email submissions accepted.

Word count is less important than making the words count, said the publisher.

All stories must be previously unpublished.

The Stinging Fly Press was founded in 2005 and operates in tandem with The Stinging Fly literary magazine.

Closing date: December 14, 2007.

Flosca Writing Competition

Flosca Short Story Competition
Deadline: 15 December, 2007
Word Limit: 3500 words.
To enter: Visit www.flosca.com
Entry Fee: €12.50
1st Prize: €1000 + Publication in the Prize-winners’ Chapbook.
2nd Prize: €250 + Publication in the Prize-winners’ Chapbook.
3rd Prize: €50 + Publication in the Prize-winners’ Chapbook.
The judge for this competition is David Means,
author of The Secret Goldfish (2006) and Assorted Fire Events (2000)

See this link for an interesting interview with the committee.

Sunday Miscellany

I have never had a piece accepted for Sunday Miscellany. I don't seem to have the knack of writing the type of script that appeals to the show. The mixture is eclectic but non-threatening, often traditional, rarely challenging and usually Irish related. They like history pieces, about places or people related to Ireland. They also take some poetry but poetry that works well on the radio is hard to write. They have an audio history of pieces, so if you are writing to fit, listen to a load first to see what works. There is also a book of pieces and poems you can buy.

Download their guidelines here. They do have open submissions and are said to be looking for new voices but they also have regular writers commissioned who appear again and again (with varying quality and interest in my opinion)

It runs evey Sunday on RTE radio 1 at 09:10, sometimes repeated. Each piece is approximately 700 words long. All scripts submitted are acknowledged, but if you haven't heard within 6 months, it's a no. If they do accept you, you have to go into an RTE studio to record. And they pay.

I thought I would post some scripts I sent that were not accepted. I don't know what else to do with them.

Croquet and Cribbage
Moving in Irish Circles
Checkpoint CharlieBetty Likes Ham
Sleeping with Seamus

TGIF

Rejection from Piatkus press in the UK. They recently been taken over by Transworld. Very tired from full week at work and now they want me to go in tomorrow, Saturday which leaves even less time for myself for writing and generally living.

Anyone in Cavan next Friday night please consider yourself invited to this night of poetry and prose.

Editors Heather Brett and Noel Monahan are publishing the 7th collection in their Authors & Artists Introductions Series. To celebrate 15 years of promoting literature and creative writing especially with young writers, the editors have a huge line-up of newer voices in this anthology. Submissions have been wonderful, from as far away as New Zealand and America to Britain and throughout Ireland,the standard and diversity gets better with each book.

In past years the editors have introduced the likes of Joe Woods, Patrick Chapman, Catriona Clutterbuck, Nessa o Mahoney, Gregoir O Dull, Susan Millar Du Mars and Lorna O Shaughnessy to the public.

Nineteen new contributors offer poetry, prose pieces, short stories and visual art. Four launches of the book have been confirmed with others to follow in the new year. The book contains short stories and poetry in the Irish language, John Corless from Mayo and Aine Durkin from Donegal, respectively, as well as the haunting Scots gaelic poetry from Peter McKay originally from the Isle of Lewis.

Stories range from the achingly beautiful tale by Catriona O Reilly (Cavan)to the quirkyness of James Lawless (Kildare), with memorable work by Alan Mc Monagle (Galway) and Phil Young from Dublin.

Galway poets Aoife Casby and Mary Madec are published alongside Mayo's Michelle O Sullivan and Co Clare's Martin Gleeson.Jim Maguire from Wexford and Stephen Farren from the other side of the country in Derry share space with Tom Conaty and Wendy Mooney from Dublin, and Kate Dempsey from Maynooth. Ginny Sullivan (New Zealand) and Jenni Meredith from Essex end the line up of poets and the visual artist featured is James Brady from Clones.

The four launch dates are:
Friday 26th October Cavan Crystal Hotel, Cavan at 8pm
Thursday 1st November Linenhall Arts Centre, Castlebar(Mayo Writers) at 7.30
Thursday 8th November Norman Villa Gallery Salthill Galway(Western Writers) at 8pm
Tuesday 20th November Stephen Green, Dublin (Poetry Ireland) at 6.30pm

The book will be on sale, a number of contributors will be reading in each venue and refreshments will be served. For further information or queries either email heatherbrett22@hotmail.com or phone 0860650908

an average day

So last Sunday I'm at home with a rotten streaming cold, looking dreadful, feeling worse than I look. I'm dosed up on Lemsip and Fisherman's Friends and going through balmed tissues as fast as a Grand Prix driver goes through tyres, as fast as Britney goes through men. I'm feeling guilty for making my daughter go to school with the same cold. There's a used tissue up my left sleeve, two used tissues up my right sleeve, one in each pocket of my jeans and an empty packet in my handbag. My head feels like someone has crammed it overful with newspapers. I can't think straight. I can't think round corners either. And I have excruciating period pains so I have a hot water bottle stuffed down my jeans, which isn't helping much, let me tell you. I'm scared to take any aspirin with the gallons of Lemsip I have already sloshing around my system. So I walk through the kitchen and my 16 year old son, no 17, how did that happen? Anyway, he cringes in the corner at the sight of me. I tell him I'm doing research on how pregnant women walk because it's such a long time for me, nearly fifteen years since I was waddling under my own steam. I splay my feet and lean back slightly, my hands supporting the small of my back. He cringes even more at that. But somehow it seems more acceptable to me to make him think I'm practising being pregnant rather than tell him I have period pains. Why is that?