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Donal Casey |
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A native of Athlone, who is now based
in Dublin, Donal trained as an illustrator
and cartoonist at art school in Madrid,
where he lived for many years. He is having
an exhibition of his political cartoons
at the Bastion Gallery and running a workshop
for children on how to create a comic strip.
He will be also giving a lecture on "Political
Cartoons in 19th Century Ireland."
His political cartoons have appeared regularly
in Magill and trade-union publications such
as Work & Life and can be seen on his
blog: donalcasey.blogspot.com.
He has also illustrated children’s
books, in particular for the Irish-language
publisher Cló Mhaigh Eo. Author and
television presenter Manchán Magan
has said of his cartoons,"There is
a warmth to Donal’s work that is engaging
- a vivacity and divilish optimism that
is refreshing in an age of snide cynicism."
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Thomas Conway |
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Thomas Conway works as a director, dramaturg,
teacher and journalist.
Directing credits include Catastrophe,
Rockaby, What Where, Beowulf, Closer,
In the Blood, Once upon a Barstool, The
King of Friday's Men, and The Gimmick.
He currently teaches contemporary theatre
practices at N.U.I.G, and has been Literary
Manager with Druid since 2005. |
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Dave o'Connell |
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Dave o'Connell is Group Editor of the
Connacht Tribune and is also a regular
presenter on RTE Radio, most notably on
Saturday View. For six years he was editor
of the Westmeath Independent, the Westmeath
Examiner and Offaly Independent. Prior
to that he was news editor of the Irish
Daily Star. |
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Jo O'Donoghue |
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Jo O'Donoghue is the publisher/proprietor
of Londubh Books in Dublin. She has more
than twenty years' experience in Irish
publishing, beginning as editorial director
with Poolbeg Press. She is the author
of a critical study of the Belfast-born
novelist, Brain Moore (Gill and Macmillan,
1990). |
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John Donohoe |
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John Donohoe owns a second hand and
anitquarian bookshop in Athlone. A clinical
psychologist, he is a graduate of Psychology
and Theology from TCD and UCD. He has
a particular interest in how people cope
with dying and with death and was the
founder and Director of the Families of
Murder Victims Service for the Victim
Support organisation. |
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Ruth Dudley Edwards |
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Ruth Dudley Edwards was born and brought
up in Dublin and educated at University
College Dublin, Girton College, Cambridge
and Wolfson College, Cambridge. Her non-fiction
books include An Atlas of Irish History,
James Connolly, Victor Gollancz: A Biography
(winner of the James Tait Black Memorial
Prize), The Pursuit of Reason: The Economist
1843-1993, The Faithful Tribe: An Intimate
Portrait of the Loyal Institutions
(shortlisted for Channel 4/The House Politico’s
Book of the Year) and Newspapermen:
Hugh Cudlipp, Cecil King and the glory days
of Fleet Street. Her Patrick Pearse: The
Triumph of Failure (winner of the National
University of Ireland Prize for Historical
Research), first published in 1977, was
reissued in 2006 by Irish Academic Press.
In 2009 she published Aftermath: The
Omagh Bombings and the Families' Pursuit
of Justice a book about the civil case
that was won on 8 June 2009 against the
Omagh bombers. Also a crime fiction writer,
her novels include: Corridors of Death,
The Saint Valentine's Day Murders, The English
School of Murder, Clubbed to Death, Matricide
at St. Martha's, Ten Lords A-Leaping, Murder
in a Cathedrals, Publish and Be Murdered,
Anglo-Irish Murders, Carnage on the Committee,
and Murdering Americans. |
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Michael Harding |
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Irish Times Columnist - author of DISPLACED
IN MULLINGAR. Michael Harding has written
3 novels and numerous plays. He received
the Bank of Ireland RTE award for excellence
in the arts (1990) and the Hennessy Award
for short stories. He was Writer in Association
with The National Theatre in 1993 and
was short-listed for the Irish Times Aer
Lingus Literature Award in 1989. |
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Oliver Hegarty |
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Oliver Hegarty lives in the Athlone area
and is a lecturer in Psychology in Athlone
Institute of Technology.
He is an experienced facilitator and has
performed the role of chairperson and
facilitator for a variety of professional,
voluntary and community organisations
during the last 20 years. |
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Sinead Kilgarriff |
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Sinead Kilgarriff is a passionate young
write who has had a play performed in
the Fringe Festival of the All Ireland
Drama Festival 2011 and has had work published
in the Westmeath Independent. She is a
member of the Kilbeggan Writers' Group. |
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John Lonergan |
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The discussion at the opening event of
the festival will focus on John Lonergan’s
book “The Governor”.
The former governor of Mountjoy Prison has
never been afraid to wear his liberal credentials
on his sleeve. An effective communicator,
he has been the most high-profile person
ever associated with the prison service
in Ireland. His book shows a man with a
humane and progressive outlook who often
found himself regarded as a maverick and
at odds with bureaucracy. John entered the
prison service in 1968 and in the years
that followed, as he saw human nature at
its worst - and often, unexpectedly, at
its best. He developed a deep understanding
both of human nature and of Irish society.
For 24 years, he was the most senior prison
officer in Ireland. He tells his fascinating
life story from his idyllic childhood in
rural Tipperary, to coming face to face
with the darkest aspects of Irish life,
to grappling with the politics of working
in a service that was the plaything of officials
and politicians. His description of life
in the prison service is not only a gripping
account of humanity at its rawest, but is
also invaluable for anyone in a management
position anywhere. |
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Philomena Lynott |
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My Boy, Philomena Lynott's story
of her son, Thin Lizzy frontman, Philip
Lynott, spent a number of weeks at No. 1
in the Non-Fiction Paperback section of
the Irish book charts. Niall Stokes,
Hot Press Editor commented on the book,
"this is an astonishing, deeply moving
and ultimately brilliantly inspiring story.
I think that it will strike an emotional
chord with people throughout the world.
Books like this are indeed rare." Philomena
Lynott will be speaking discussing her book
at a festival event with Hot Press Journalist
Jackie Hayden. |
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Mrs Justice Catherine McGuinness |
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Mrs Justice Catherine McGuinness will
also take part in this years festival. She
is a former President of the Law Reform
Commission and Supreme Court Judge. She
is an adjunct Professor at the Faculty of
Law at NUIG. |
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Nuala Ní Chonchúir |
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Born in Dublin in 1970, Nuala Ní
Chonchúir is a full-time fiction
writer and poet, living in Ballinsloe. She
has published three collections of short
fiction, including Nude (Salt, 2009) which
was shortlisted for the 2010 Edge Hill Short
Story Prize; three poetry collections -
one in an anthology, one a pamphlet - and
one novel, You (New Island, 2010). Nuala’s
third full poetry collection The Juno
Charm is forthcoming from Salmon Poetry
in 2011.Nuala was chosen by The Irish
Times as a writer to watch in 2009;
she has won many short fiction prizes including
the Cúirt New Writing Prize, RTÉ
radio’s Francis MacManus Award, the
inaugural Jonathan Swift Award and the Cecil
Day Lewis Award. She was shortlisted for
the European Prize for Literature.She will
be taking part in an event at the festival
which will look at how landscape affects
writing. |
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Senator Marie Louise O’Donnell |
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DCU Communications Lecturer and newly
appointed Senator Marie Louise O’Donnell
is known to many people through her media
work and for her mile-a-minute enthusiasm
and engaging communications style. We are
thrilled to announce her participation in
Athlone Literary Festival 2011. |
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Gabriel Rosenstock |
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A member of Aosdána (the Irish
Academy of Arts and Letters), Gabriel Rosenstock
has given readings in Europe, the US, India,
Australia, Japan and has been published
in various leading international journals
including Akzente, Neue Rundschau, and die
horen (Germany), Poetry (Chicago) and World
Haiku Review. His selected poems (from the
Irish) have appeared in German, English
and Hungarian. He has translated into Irish
the selected poems of, among others, Seamus
Heaney, Gunter Grass, and Muhammad Iqbal
and his Irish-language versions of haiku
masters Issa, Buson and Shiki have won him
critical acclaim. His Selected Poems/
Rogha Dánta (Cló Iar-Chonnachta)
appeared in 2005 and the bilingual volume
Bliain an Bhandé/ Year of the
Goddess came out in 2007 (Dedalus).
In 2009 he was awarded the Tamgha-I-Khidmat
medal by the President of the Islamic Republic
of Pakistan. |
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Nicole Rourke |
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Nicole Rourke has trained in theatre and
workshop facilitation in the Middle East.
She has written, performed and directed
several pieces for theatre. Nicole worked
as a creative writing facilitator at the
Irish Writers Centre from 2006 to 2009.
She is a co-director of Big Smoke Writing
Factory which provides creative writing
for new and developing writers. |
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