The 38th Cúirt International Festival of Literature is just around the corner and the programme is jam-packed with Irish and international authors.
Sebastian Barry, award-winning author and former Laureate for Irish Fiction, will join acclaimed Irish writer Clare-Louise Bennett in the Town Hall Theatre on Saturday 22 April at 8pm to bring his latest novel Old God’s Time to Galway.
Born in Dublin in 1955, Sebastian’s Barry’s novels and plays have won numerous awards, including the Kerry Group Irish Fiction Prize, Costa Book of the Year award, Irish Book Awards Best Novel.
Two consecutive novels, A Long Long Way (2005) and The Secret Scripture (2008), were shortlisted for the MAN Booker Prize. His novel Days Without End (2016) won the Costa Book of the Year Award and The Walter Scott Prize, and was longlisted for the Booker Prize.
Anne Enright, one of Ireland’s most prolific and celebrated writers, and the inaugural Laureate for Irish Fiction, will join Louise Kennedy and Glenn Patterson on stage for the finale of Cúirt International Festival of Literature, on Sunday 23 April at 7pm.
Anne Enright’s novel The Gathering (2007) won the Man Booker Prize and The Green Road (2015) won the Bord Gáis Energy Novel of the Year Award.
In 2018 she received the Irish PEN Award for Outstanding Contribution to Irish Literature and her latest novel, Actress (2020) was shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2020. Her work has been translated into almost 40 languages.
Louise Kennedy’s debut novel Tresspasses won the An Post Novel of the Year in 2022.
On Friday evening at 8.30pm multi-award winning author Max Porter, author of Grief is a Thing with Feathers, will be joined in conversation by Sinéad Gleeson, where they will discuss his new book Shy. Max Porter will also perform a dramatic interpretation from the novel.
American author Carmen Maria Machado, will discuss her body of work with Sinéad Gleeson on Thursday 20th April at 8:30pm in An Taidhbhearc.
Her work has been awarded many prizes, including the Folio Prize, the Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Fiction and been shortlisted for the National Book Award.
Machado writes beautifully about contemporary horrors, touching on queer and feminist issues with a revolutionary, eclectic style that has made her one of the most influential writers in today’s literary scene.
Carmen Maria Machado is the author of the acclaimed short story collection Her Body and Other Parties (Graywolf Press, 2017) and the bestselling memoir In the Dream House (Graywolf Press, 2019).
She has been a finalist for the National Book Award and the winner of numerous prizes, such as the Bard Fiction Prize, the Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Fiction, the Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ Nonfiction and the Shirley Jackson Award, among others.
Her essays, fiction, and criticism have appeared in numerous publications, including the New Yorker, The New York Times, Granta and Vogue.
Award-winning and celebrated Irish writers Donal Ryan and Wendy Erskine will be in conversation with Edel Coffey on Saturday afternoon at 4pm in the Town Hall Theatre.
Manchán Magan will be taking part in two events during the festival. On Friday 20th at 5:30pm he will be discussing memoir and nature with Séan Hewitt and Amanda Thomson, and on Saturday afternoon at 1pm he will be joined by Eoghan Daltun and Emma Must for A Changing Climate: Writing, Activism and the Environment.
Emer McLysaght, author of the Aisling series of novels, will be joining Caroline O’Donaghue for a live episode of the hit podcast Sentimental Garbage on Sunday 23 April at 4pm in the Town Hall Theatre, where they’ll be talking about novels, films, and all sorts of popular culture.
Cúirt International Festival of Literature would like to acknowledge the support of its principal funders the Arts Council, Galway City Council and Galway County Council.
The festival takes place in Galway from Tuesday 18 – Sunday 23 April, 2023. Some events are sold out, so advanced booking is advised at http://www.cuirt.ie or through the Town Hall Theatre on 091 569 777.
