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We begin this weeks's show with In Trust. In Gratitude. In Hope. 10 Years at the Laois Arthouse, an exhibition featuring the work of over 60 artists who have been part of the Laois Arthouse programme since its establishment in 2011 by Laois County Council Arts Service. Enda talks about a book that has impressed her recently, The Black Snow by Paul Lynch.
Our guest this morning is John McAuliffe, whose Selected Poems, was published last year by Gallery Press. John talks about his work and his Toaster Challenge Choice, In the Same Light: 200 Tang Poems for Today by Wong May, which is a Poetry Books  Society Translation Choice for Spring 2022.

McAuliffe’s gift is to be mindful of elsewheres. He swerves to effect: his shrewd sideways and backwards glances count, pouring light on a subject from several directions simultaneously. Any given moment is likely to be underpinned by what went on before or what is to come. He knows the power of parallel universes.

 — Kate Kellaway, The Observer

Intro/outro music: Colm Mac Con Iomaire, ‘Thou Shalt Not Carry’ from The Hare’s Corner, 2008, with thanks to Colm for permission to use it.

Artwork by Freya Sirr

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This morning actor and writer Gabriel Byrne talks to Books for Breakfast about his newly published memoir Walking with Ghosts. In a lively and wide ranging conversation with hosts Enda Wyley and Peter Sirr Gabriel talks about his love of reading, his favourite writers, and the importance of memory for both acting and writing,

Intro/outro music: Colm Mac Con Iomaire, ‘Thou Shalt Not Carry’ from The Hare’s Corner, 2008, with thanks to Colm for permission to use it.

Artwork by Freya Sirr

To subscribe to Books for Breakfast go to your podcast provider of choice (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google etc) and search for the podcast then hit subscribe or follow, or simply click the appropriate button above. 

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Today's show is devoted to an in-depth interview with poet Thomas McCarthy, whose Poetry, Memory and the Party: Journals 1974-2014 has recently been published by Gallery Press. The journals span forty years of Thomas McCarthy’s life lived between a modest background and the ‘Big House’ of West Waterford and his immersion in the literary life of Cork against the troubles of a changing Ireland. It's an intimate portrait of a poet's life with all its attendant excitements and frustrations, as well an engrossing account of the literary and social milieu of  Cork, the Anglo-Irish world of the Brigadier whose Victorian garden he replanted, and his travels farther afield.

‘For those interested in literature, this is addictive reading material, offering unparalleled insight into the many joys and sundry frustrations of someone who determined early to devote himself to the pursuit of his literary vocation.’ — Clíona Ní Ríordáin, The Irish Times

Thomas's Toaster Challenge choice is Ethel Mannin's Young in the Twenties.

Intro/outro music: Colm Mac Con Iomaire, ‘Thou Shalt Not Carry’ from The Hare’s Corner, 2008, with thanks to Colm for permission to use it.

Artwork by Freya Sirr

To subscribe to Books for Breakfast go to your podcast provider of choice (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google etc) and search for the podcast then hit subscribe or follow, or simply click the appropriate button above. 

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A special Christmas Eve edition of Books for Breakfast. In the last episode of the year we pay  tribute to the work of Thomas Kinsella 1928-2021. We also feature some highlights from this year’s podcast. So take a break from turkey basting and join us for a listen!

Intro/outro music: Colm Mac Con Iomaire, ‘Thou Shalt Not Carry’ from The Hare’s Corner, 2008, with thanks to Colm for permission to use it.

Artwork by Freya Sirr

To subscribe to Books for Breakfast go to your podcast provider of choice (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google etc) and search for the podcast then hit subscribe or follow, or simply click the appropriate button above. 

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'A single one of Keegan's grounded, powerful sentences can contain volumes of social history. Every word is the right word in the right place, and the effect is resonant and deeply moving.'
– Hilary Mantel

'A haunting, hopeful  masterpiece'.
– Sinéad Gleeson

'Astonishing ... Claire Keegan makes her moments real – and then makes them matter.'
– Colm Tóibín

'A moral tale that is unsentimental and deeply affecting, because true and right.'
– Andrew O'Hagan

Some of the responses to Claire Keegan's new book. Today on Books for Breakfast, in an extended and wide-ranging interview,  Claire talks to us about and reads from  Small Things Like These.

Intro/outro music: Colm Mac Con Iomaire, ‘Thou Shalt Not Carry’ from The Hare’s Corner, 2008, with thanks to Colm for permission to use it.

Artwork by Freya Sirr

To subscribe to Books for Breakfast go to your podcast provider of choice (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google etc) and search for the podcast then hit subscribe or follow, or simply click the appropriate button above. 

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On today's show we talk to two poets who have published new collections: Eleanor Hooker, whose Of Ochre and Ash is published by Dedalus Press, and Amanda Bell whose Riptide is available from Doire Press. Eleanor's Toaster Challenge choice is 'Snow Woman',  a poem by Breda Wall Ryan while Amanda chooses 'I Worried',  a poem by Mary Oliver.
And we mark the passing of two fine Irish poets, Máire Mhac an tSaoi and Brendan Kennelly.

Intro/outro music: Colm Mac Con Iomaire, ‘Thou Shalt Not Carry’ from The Hare’s Corner, 2008, with thanks to Colm for permission to use it.

Artwork by Freya Sirr

To subscribe to Books for Breakfast go to your podcast provider of choice (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google etc) and search for the podcast then hit subscribe or follow, or simply click the appropriate button above. 

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On today's show we talk to Liam Carson, director of the Irish language literary festival IMRAM about this year's wide-ranging and adventurous hybrid programme, which starts today. And we talk to Alannah Hopkin about her honest and heartbreaking literary memoir of the lives of two Irish writers,  A Very Strange Man : A Memoir of Aidan Higgins, published by New Island Books. Alannah's Toaster Challenge choice is Songs for the Flames, stories by International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award winner Juan Gabriel Vasquez.

Intro/outro music: Colm Mac Con Iomaire, ‘Thou Shalt Not Carry’ from The Hare’s Corner, 2008, with thanks to Colm for permission to use it.

Artwork by Freya Sirr

To subscribe to Books for Breakfast go to your podcast provider of choice (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google etc) and search for the podcast then hit subscribe or follow, or simply click the appropriate button above. 

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Today's show is a short story special and double Toaster Challenge edition. We begin with John MacKenna whose We Seldom Talk About the Past, the first selection of short stories from one of Ireland's great masters of the form, has just been published by New Island. John's Toaster Challenge choice is Raymond Carver's All of Us: The Collected Poems.
Next up is Madeleine D'Arcy, who talks about her follow up to her award-winning first collection Waiting for the Bullet with Liberty Terrace, published by Doire Press. Madeleine's Toaster Challenge choice is Alastair McLeod's No Great Mischief.  A very full programme today; enjoy!

Intro/outro music: Colm Mac Con Iomaire, ‘Thou Shalt Not Carry’ from The Hare’s Corner, 2008, with thanks to Colm for permission to use it.

Artwork by Freya Sirr

To subscribe to Books for Breakfast go to your podcast provider of choice (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google etc) and search for the podcast then hit subscribe or follow, or simply click the appropriate button above. 

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Why have women been treated differently, and discriminated against, in the literary world? Why has gender been a ‘problem’ in the writing, publishing, funding and reviewing scene? And why does it matter? Éilis Ni Dhuibhne asked twenty one writers who were born in mid-twentieth-century Ireland, north and south, to write about their literary lives. The resulting essays, full of fascinating insights into the journeys of these writers, are published as  Look! It’s a Woman Writer!: Irish Literary Feminisms, 1970-2020 edited by Eilis Ni Dhuibhne. Enda interviews Éilis and writer Catherine Dunne, who also contributes to the book. 

Intro/outro music: Colm Mac Con Iomaire, ‘Thou Shalt Not Carry’ from The Hare’s Corner, 2008, with thanks to Colm for permission to use it.

Artwork by Freya Sirr

To subscribe to Books for Breakfast go to your podcast provider of choice (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google etc) and search for the podcast then hit subscribe or follow, or simply click the appropriate button above. 

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To celebrate thirty years of the Irish  Writers Centre, Enda talks to co-host Peter, who was the first director of the Centre, about the early years, and Peter talks to current director Valerie Bistany about current activities and plans for the future. And the toaster is back in action, with Valerie choosing Kent Haruf’s Plainsong for her Toaster Challenge.

Intro/outro music: Colm Mac Con Iomaire, ‘Thou Shalt Not Carry’ from The Hare’s Corner, 2008, with thanks to Colm for permission to use it.

Artwork by Freya Sirr

To subscribe to Books for Breakfast go to your podcast provider of choice (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google etc) and search for the podcast then hit subscribe or follow, or simply click the appropriate button above. 

Support the show