8 February 2016
By Bryan T. Smyth
bryan@TheCork.ie
Arts report
The full programme for the 2016 Cork World Book Festival will be announced shortly but for now mark your diary for the locations of The Cork City Library and Triskel Christchurch and for the dates of April 19–23 2016.
Maeve Higgins, Louis de Paor, Kevin Barry, Rod Nordland, Maram al-Masri are just some of the writers and poets in the line-up. Now in its 11th year, the festival will once again have workshops, a Teen Day, children’s events, an exhibition of books and an outdoor market.
Author Kevin Barry will appear at the International Festival of Authors Oct. 30, Nov. 1 and Nov. 2.
“Words were central to the 1916 Easter Rising, the inspirational words in the Proclamation, the writings of Connolly, Pearse and the other signatories,” says Liam Ronayne, Cork City Librarian and Chair of the Fest. “The Cork World Book Fest’s programme for 2016 will reflect the continuing importance of the Easter Rising, both in Ireland and in the wider world. The festival will open with Poets’ Revolution, featuring writers whose work is socially and politically engaged. We have four international poets travelling to Cork for the event: Turkish Kurdish poet and journalist, Bejan Matur; Palestinian poet and writer, Mourid Barghouti; Scottish poet Liz Lochhead; and Basque poet Itxaro Borda. The exhibition The Poets Revolution: 1916 and Irish Literature at Cork City Library’s foyer will showcase books from the era and inspired by the Rising.”
New York Times and Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Rod Nordland will pay a first visit to Cork and will feature in an event titled Shedding Light on the Muslim World. Nordland’s non-fiction book The Lovers grew from a series of articles he wrote followed the plight of a young Afghan couple, one a Shia and the other a Sunni who risked their lives to be together. He will be joined by Syrian poet Maram al-Masri and her translator Theo Dorgan.
Cobh comedienne Maeve Higgins will make her way home from New York to promote her new book, Away from Home and Loving it. Sort of. ‘Off you go’. A lucky Cork audience will be first to savour the much-anticipated bilingual collection of contemporary Irish language poets called Leabhar na hAthghabhála / Poems of Repossession, edited by celebrated Irish Language poet Louis de Paor who will introduce and MC the reading. Back to Cork by popular demand, Kevin Barry will discuss his new venture, the first volume of what he hopes will be an annual arts anthology of stories, essays, reportage, photography and visual arts for Ireland and beyond titled Winter Page 1.
