Winter’s Bone author and acclaimed American ‘country noir’ novelist, Daniel Woodrell; Pulitzer Prize-Winning American poet, Jorie Graham; and award winning Irish author Bernard MacLaverty, will all read at next year's Cúirt festival.
The 33rd Cúirt International Festival of Literature takes place from Monday April 23 to Sunday 29, and among the other writers who will be attending the festival are the Pakistani-born British poet and artist, Imtiaz Dharker, winner of the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry; Forward Prize Winner and poet, Sinead Morrissey; and Prof Declan Kiberd. The 2018 programme has been curated by the festival's new programme director, Emily Cullen.
Imtiaz Dharker, who will read from her new poetry collection Luck Is The Hook, to be published next March, is an award-winning poet and artist - all her collections are illustrated with her drawings. An exhibition of her drawings will be on display during the festival. Scholar, writer, and leading international authority on Irish literature, Prof Declan Kiberd, will discuss his recent book After Ireland: Writing the Nation from Beckett to the Present.
Daniel Woodrell's novels, Winter’s Bone, Tomoto Red, and Woe To Live On, have all been adapted for the screen. Belfast’s inaugural Poet Laureate, Sinead Morrissey, will present poems from her Forward prize-winning collection, On Balance. Bernard MacLaverty, winner of Novel of the Year prize at the 2017 Bord Gáis Energy Irish Book Awards, will read from his novel, Midwinter Break. Jorie Graham, the first woman to be appointed Boylston Professor at Harvard, having replaced Seamus Heaney, will read from her latest collection, Fast.
“The Cúirt Festival has a long tradition as a vibrant place of ideas and debate at the heart of a cultural capital," said programme director Emily Cullen. "A commitment to the promotion of Irish language writers is also a significant feature of the Cúirt festival in a city with a unique bilingual status. I’m looking forward to sharing the full festival line-up with audiences in the new year.”
The festival will also feature discussions, spoken word, poetry slams, music, theatre and visual art exhibitions. The full festival line-up will be announced in February. Tickets go on sale in 2018. For more see www.cuirt.ie
