UPDATE: Louise Kennedy announced as special guest. We’re delighted to welcome this late addition to our line up for Friday’s event:
Louise Kennedy grew up in Holywood, Co Down. Her writing has been published in journals including Banshee, The Tangerine, Stinging Fly, in the Irish Times and Belfast Telegraph, and read on BBC Radio 4 and RTE Radio 1. Her short stories have won prizes and in 2019 she was shortlisted for both Sunday Times Audible Short Story Award and writing.ie Irish Short Story of the Year. She is a PhD student at Queens University Belfast where she’s researching the life and work of the writer Norah Hoult. Bloomsbury published her debut short story collection The End of the World is a Cul de Sac in January 2021 to critical acclaim and her novel Trespasses was published earlier this year. She lives in Sligo.
After ten sold out seasons at the Irish Arts Center in New York and two highly successful Irish tours, Muldoon’s Picnic comes to An Grianán Theatre for one night only.
An omnium-gatherum of poetry, prose and music, Muldoon’s Picnic is hosted by Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Paul Muldoon joined by house band Rogue Oliphant, a collective of musicians and composers including Cait O’Riordan (The Pogues).
Special musical and literary guests on the night include Maurice Riordan, Duke Special and Hannah Sullivan.
We regret that, due to unforeseen circumstances, Claire Keegan will no longer be able to perform.
This tour is produced by Poetry Ireland and supported by an Arts Council / An Chomhairle Ealaíon and Arts Council of Northern Ireland Touring Grant.
“music-and-literature extravaganza”. Time Out New York
“a superb and memorable night. Highly recommended” New York Irish Arts
The Special Guests:
Maurice Riordan’s most recent collection is Shoulder Tap, published by Faber in October 2021. Previous books include A Word from the Loki (1995), Floods (2000), The Holy Land (2007) and The Water Stealer (2013). He edited The Finest Music, an anthology of early Irish lyrics in translation, and A Quark for Mister Mark: 101 Poems about Science. He has received the Michael Hartnett Award, a Cholmondeley Award from the Society of Authors, and a PEN translation award. He is a former editor of The Poetry Review and is Emeritus Professor of Poetry at Sheffield Hallam University. Born in Lisgoold, Co. Cork, he lives in London, where he teaches at the Faber Academy.
By nature Duke Special is a curious person. He is curious about theatre, books, music, poetry, art, love, life, redemption, death, and 78RPM records. All of this is evidenced by his many recordings which are a map of his passions.
Duke is currently writing songs based on the paintings of Italian painter, Amedeo Modigliani, and interpreting old Irish-American Tin Pan Alley song sheets. His most recent release was based on the poetry of the eminent Belfast poet, Michael Longley and is called ‘Hallow.’ As ever, Duke Special is mining a new seam of inspiration, always trying to get to the bottom of what it means to be human.
Hannah Sullivan is a poet and academic living in London. Her first collection Three Poems, published by Faber in 2018 and FSG in 2020, was awarded the T. S. Eliot Prize and the inaugural John Pollard Foundation International Prize. Her second book Was It for This will be published in 2023. She teaches modern English Literature at New College, Oxford, and has also written an academic book on revision and modernism.
