Poetry Island - Evolution of a Poet
In association with Poetry Ireland
Saturday 31 May
3pm (duration 1h)
Anita’s, Mountshannon
€10, €8 with wristband
The theme of Mountshannon Arts Festival 2025 is ‘Evolution’ and we have invited Limerick poet Michael Dooley, author of recently released first collection ‘In Spring We Turned to Water’ to join up and coming Belfast poet Niamh McNally in a poetry reading and discussion that charts the evolution of their work so far.
In conjunction with Scariff Bay Community Radio we will record this event for later broadcast/podcast.
Michael Dooley
Michael Dooley’s poems have appeared in Banshee, the Irish Independent, Poetry Ireland Review, The Stinging Fly, and have been broadcast on RTÉ Radio One. He has had work shortlisted for prizes including The Patrick Kavanagh Award, The Strokestown International Poetry Competition, The Fool for Poetry International Chapbook Competition, and The Cúirt New Writing Prize. His debut collection, In Spring We Turned to Water (Doire Press), was shortlisted for the Farmgate Café National Poetry Award.
Niamh McNally
Niamh McNally is a Belfast-based poet. She completed her MA in Ulster University where she co-created and was a poetry editor for The Paperclip; a student-led literary publication. Niamh is a workshop facilitator in The Seamus Heaney Homeplace, and co-ordinated the Freedom To Write Project 2024. She has been published in: The Tulsa Review, Tír na nÓg, The Galway Review, Aôthen Magazine, Words by the Water, and HOWL: New Irish Writing, and her poetry has featured on the BBC, in two climate crisis films: 'It Seems', produced by The Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission & 'Defining Hope', produced by BITCNI. She was commissioned to write for the One Young World Summit (2023) and her poem ‘If Stone Could Speak’ was showcased by Bushmills as promotion for 'The Causeway Collection.' Niamh's first, solo publication 'New Impressions' was published by The John Hewitt Society and the ACNI, and just recently, she has read her poetry in The UN Buffer Zone (Cyprus) as part of Herstory's Peace Heroines Project, The NI Executive Office (Brussels), The Embassy of Ireland (The Hague), and in Dublin Castle for the 3rd Shared Island Forum. As part of the Shared Island Project, funded by The Government of Ireland, Niamh collaborated with artists from across the island and they produced 'Shared Island Symphony' - led by Alan Gilsenan (Yellow Asylum Films). Niamh is the current Poet-in-Residence for Herstory, Ireland & Translink NI. She is leading Translink's Poetry in Motion campaign and her poem 'Line Work' has just been painted on the ceiling of York Street Station's underpass as part of her residency.