NEW YEAR POETRY WORKSHOPS AT GALWAY ARTS CENTRE WITH KEVIN HIGGINS

Starting in January, Galway Arts Centre is offering aspiring poets a choice of three poetry workshops, all facilitated by poet Kevin Higgins, whose best-selling first collection, The Boy With No Face, published by Salmon Poetry, was short-listed for the 2006 Strong Award for Best First Collection by an Irish poet. Kevin’s second collection of poems, Time Gentlemen, Please, was published in 2008 by Salmon Poetry and his poetry is discussed in The Cambridge Introduction to Modern Irish Poetry. His third collection Frightening New Furniture was published in 2010 by Salmon. His work also appears in the generation defining anthology Identity Parade –New British and Irish Poets (Ed. Roddy Lumsden, Bloodaxe, 2010) and The Hundred Years’ War: modern war poems (Ed Neil Astley, Bloodaxe April 2014).  A collection of Kevin’s essays and book reviews, Mentioning The War, was published by Salmon Poetry in 2012. Kevin’s poetry has been translated into Greek, Russian, Spanish, Italian, Japanese & Portuguese. His fourth collection of poetry, The Ghost in the Lobby, was published last year by Salmon. Kevin's poetry was the subject of a paper 'The Case of Kevin Higgins, or, The Present State of Irish Poetic Satire' presented by David Wheatley at a Symposium on Satire at the University of Aberdeen. Kevin is satirist-in-residence with the alternative literature website The Bogman’s Cannon. His next book 2016 – The Selected Satires of Kevin Higgins will be published by NuaScéalta very early in 2016. Song of Songs 2:0 – New & Selected Poems will be published by Salmon in Spring 2017.  

Each week Kevin will give participants a poetry writing exercise for the following week and will offer each participant constructive suggestions as to how her or his poem can become the best possible poem it can be.
 
Kevin is an experienced workshop facilitator and several of his students have gone on to achieve publication success. One of his workshop participants at Galway Arts Centre won the prestigious Hennessy Award for New Irish Poetry, two have won the Cúirt New Writing Prize, and yet another the Cúirt Poetry Grand Slam, while several have published collections of their poems; two being shortlisted for the Shine-Strong Award for Best First Collection of poems. In 2013 a group of his students set up the poetry newspaper Skylight 47, which publishes new poems, reviews of poetry books and opinion pieces about poetry related matters. Kevin teaches poetry on the NUI Galway Summer School programme and on the NUIG BA Creative Writing Connect programme. Kevin is also co-organiser of the successful Over The Edge reading series which specialises in promoting new writers. 


Each workshop will run for ten weeks, commencing the week of January 18^th. They will take place on Tuesday evenings, 7-8.30pm (first class January 19^th); on Thursday afternoons, 2-4pm (first class January 21^st) and on Friday afternoons, 2-3.30pm (first class January 22nd).

The Tuesday evening and Friday afternoon workshops are open to both complete beginners as well as those who’ve been writing for some time. The Thursday afternoon workshop is an Advanced Poetry Workshop, suitable for those who’ve participated in poetry workshops before or had poems published in magazines. The cost to participants is €110, with an €100 concession rate.

Places must be paid for in advance. To reserve a place contact reception at Galway Arts Centre, 47 Dominick Street, phone 091 565886 or email info@galwayartscentre.ie  

Galway University Hospitals Arts Trust is seeking entries again for its exciting annual poetry competition

CRITERIA: poems entered in the competition should be no more than 30 lines long. They must be the original work of the entrant. Poems previously published in magazines or poetry collections are eligible. Multiple entries are accepted; poets can enter as many poems as they wish.

PRIZE 
*the winner will have her or his poem published and displayed on the Arts Corridor of University Hospital Galway as part of the 2016 Poems For Patience. Poems For Patience is a long running series which over the past decade has featured poems by leading Irish and international poets such as Seamus Heaney, Philip Schultz, Jane Hirschfield, Michael Longley, Vona Groarke, Tess Gallagher and many more. The poems after exhibition on the Arts Corridor are then displayed in waiting areas throughout Galway University Hospitals.
*the winner will be invited to read his or her winning poem at the launch of the 2016 Poems For Patience at the Cúirt International Festival of Literature in April 2016.
*the winner will be provided with accommodation in Galway for one night during the 2016 Cúirt International Festival of Literature
*the winner will be given a copy of their poem printed as a Poem for Patience poster
*the winner will be asked to submit six poems for consideration to be a Featured Reader at the Over The Edge: Open Reading series in Galway City Library. 

ENTRY FEE: to enter one poem the fee is €10. If you enter two or more poems the entry fee is €7.50 per poem i.e. to enter two poems it costs €15, to enter three poems €22.50 and so on.


Payment should be made by cheque or postal order payable to Galway University Hospitals Arts Trust. 

Entries should be sent by post to Margaret Flannery, Arts Director, Galway University Hospitals Arts Trust, Galway University Hospitals, University Hospital, Newcastle Road, Galway. Do not put your name on the poems; please include your contact details on a separate sheet. 

THE CLOSING DATE is Friday, March 11th 2016.

THE JUDGE: The competition judge is Kevin Higgins. Kevin Higgins is Writer-in-Residence with Galway University Hospitals Arts Trust. He facilitates poetry workshops at Galway Arts Centre; teaches creative writing at Galway Technical Institute and on the Brothers of Charity Away With Words programme. Kevin also teaches poetry on the NUI Galway Summer School programme and on the NUIG BA Creative Writing Connect programme. He is the poetry critic of the Galway Advertiser. Kevin is co-organiser of Over The Edge literary events. His first collection of poems The Boy With No Face was published by Salmon in February 2005 and was short-listed for the 2006 Strong Award. His second collection, Time Gentlemen, Please, was published in March 2008 by Salmon. His work also features in the anthology Identity Parade – New British and Irish Poets (Ed Roddy Lumsden, Bloodaxe, 2010) and in The Hundred Years’ War: modern war poems (Ed Neil Astley, Bloodaxe, 2014). Frightening New Furniture, his third collection of poems, was published in 2010 by Salmon Poetry. Mentioning The War, a collection of his essays and reviews was published by Salmon in 2012. Kevin has read his work at most of the major literary festivals in Ireland and at Arts Council and Culture Ireland supported poetry events in Kansas City, USA (2006), Los Angeles, USA (2007), London, UK (2007), New York, USA (2008), Athens, Greece (2008); St. Louis, USA (2008), Chicago, USA (2009), Denver, USA (2010), Washington D.C (2011), Huntington, West Virginia, USA (2011), Geelong, Australia (2011), Canberra, Australia (2011), St. Louis, Missouri (2013), Boston, Massachusetts (2013) & Amherst, Massachusetts (2013). His poetry has been translated into Greek, Spanish, Italian, Japanese, Russian, & Portuguese. Kevin’s fourth collection of poetry, The Ghost In The Lobby, was published by Salmon Poetry in 2014. Kevin is satirist-in-residence with the alternative literature website The Bogman’s Cannon. His next book 2016 – The Selected Satires of Kevin Higgins will be published by NuaScéalta very early in 2016. Song of Songs 2:0 – New & Selected Poems will be published by Salmon in Spring 2017.

For further details: Tel: +353 (0)91 544979 Email: Margaret.Flannery@hse.ie  

Final Over The Edge: Open Reading of 2015 with leading UK poet Kim Moore, Felicia McCarthy, & Michael Gallagher

The December ‘Over The Edge: Open Reading’ takes place in Galway City Library on Thursday, December 17^th, 6.30-8.00pm. The Featured Readers are Kim Moore, Michael Gallagher, & Felicia ‘Flish’ McCarthy. There will as usual be an open-mic after the Featured Readers have finished. New readers are especially welcome. The Over The Edge Christmas celebration will take place afterwards. 

Felicia ‘Flish’ McCarthy took an Honours BA and MA in English Language and Literature at Trinity College Dublin. She has lived in Dublin, Denver, & now Salthill where she works as a professional Energy Medicine Practitioner when she is not fooling around with words. She is a regular participant in poetry workshops at Galway Arts Centre. She was shortlisted for the 2015 Baillieborough Poetry Prize. Her poems have appeared in publications such as Boyne Berries, Infusions, This Never Happened II, and the RNLI anthology The Sea. 

Before switching to prose, Michael Gallagher enjoyed considerable success as a scriptwriter. He has written comedy for the both the BBC and Channel Four and has co-written several plays. In 2014 he won the Galway’s Great Read creative writing competition with his short story, ‘First Light’. Michael is a modest man not given to outlandish boasts or hyperbole and is currently employed as editor of the breathtakingly brilliant free Galway magazine, Westword.

Kim Moore was born in 1981 and lives and works in Cumbria. She is one of the leading new voices in British poetry. Her first full length collection The Art of Falling was published by Seren in April 2015.  She won a New Writing North Award in 2014, an Eric Gregory Award in 2011 and the Geoffrey Dearmer Prize in 2012. In 2014 she was Poet in Residence for Ilkley Literature Festival and Digital Poet in Residence for The Poetry School. Her first pamphlet If We Could Speak Like Wolves was a winner in The Poetry Business Pamphlet Competition, judged by Carol Ann Duffy.  If We Could Speak Like Wolves was chosen as an Independent Book of the Year in 2012 and was shortlisted for the Michael Marks Pamphlet Award and the Lakeland Book of the Year Award. Her work has been anthologised in Salt’s Best British Poetry 2012 and Oxfam’s Lung Jazz.  

As usual there will be an open-mic after the Featured Readers have finished. New readers are always most welcome. The MC for the evening will be Susan Millar DuMars. For further details phone 087-6431748.

Over The Edge acknowledges the ongoing generous financial support of Galway City Council, Poetry Ireland,  & The Arts Council.

 

Over The Edge just received the great news that the Arts Council are increasing the funding we will receive for our literary events in 2016 by 75% compared to this year.

November Over The Edge: Open Reading with Caroline Healy, Dagmar Drabent, & Gemma Marren

The November ‘Over The Edge: Open Reading’ takes place in Galway City Library on Thursday, November 19^th, 6.30-8.00pm. The Featured Readers are Caroline Healy, Dagmar Drabent, & Gemma Marren. There will as usual be an open-mic after the Featured Readers have finished. This month’s open-mic will continue our showcase of the poetry students from this year’s MA in Writing at NUI Galway. New readers are always especially welcome at the open-mic. 

Gemma Marren was raised in London by Irish parents. She was a finalist in the Irish Writers’ Centre 2015 Novel Fair competition, with the novel The Only Child. She works as a freelance academic copy-editor and when her head is not wedged in a book, she spends her time baking cakes and playing tag rugby. She lives in the wilds of Mayo with her husband and four children.

Dagmar Drabent, originally from Hamburg, Germany, lives in Galway, for nearly 30 years. At the moment she is finishing her PhD about Swiss writer Robert Walser at NUI Galway. She is also an artist and therapist and has been writing poetry and participating in poetry workshops for the past couple of years. Her poems have been published in Crannόg, Skylight 47, Orbis, and Blue Max Review.

Caroline Healy is an award winning writer and novelist. She writes literary fiction and young adult contemporary fiction. A graduate of the Seamus Heaney Centre, Belfast she divides her time between writing and teaching. Her short story collection entitled A Stitch in Time won Doire Press’s International Chapbook Short Story Competition. Her work has featured in publications such as Wordlegs, Prole, the Irish Writers’ Centre Lonely Voice and Five Stop Stories. She is a recipient of multiple awards from the Arts Council. Her work has been showcased at many literary events across Ireland, the U.K. and America. Caroline is currently editing her second short story collection, The House of Water, as well as final edits for her next novel, published with Bloomsbury Publishing.   

As usual there will be an open-mic after the Featured Readers have finished. This month’s open-mic will continue our showcase of the poetry students from this year’s MA in Writing at NUI Galway. New readers are always most welcome. The MC for the evening will be Susan Millar DuMars. For further details phone 087-6431748. 

Over The Edge acknowledges the ongoing generous financial support of Galway City Council, Poetry Ireland & The Arts Council.

2015 Over The Edge New Writer of The Year THE WINNERS!

The winner in the fiction category and 2015 Over The Edge New Writer of The Year is Paul Duffy from Wicklow for his short story 'Redolence'. Paul receives a cash prize of €700 and his short story manuscript will be read by Doire Press. Paul will be a Featured Reader at an Over The Edge: Open Reading during the first half of 2016. Paul also receives a basket of books from Kenny’s Bookshop.

The poetry winner is Bennett McNiff from Drogheda, for his poem 'Stavrogin in Iceland'. Bennett receives a cash prize of €300; his poetry manuscript will be read by Salmon Poetry.

Runners up and highly commended in Poetry:

2^nd place: Rachel Coventry from Galway for ‘What Did I Do To Deserve You’

3^rd place: Paul McCarrick from Athlone for ‘Thanks to the Internet’.

Runners up and highly commended in Fiction:

2^nd place: Dermot Duffy from Dublin for ‘Luke Kelly’s Bones’.

3^rd place: Michelle Coyne from Galway for ‘The Sniper’

You can read the shortlist here.

We thank our judge Dave Lordan and our sponsors: Charlie Byrne’s Bookshop; Dock No, 1, ISupply Quay Street; Ward’s Hotel; Derek  Nolan TD; Clare Daly TD; and Kenny’s Bookshop & Gallery.