Reading all about it

The literary promises of Cork 2005 will be inaugurated at Triskel tonight, with Gregory O'Donoghue reading the work of Bulgarian poet Kristin Dimatrova in the "Translations" series.

Equally promising will be the weekend readings in the World Writing series with writers from Doris Lessing and Claudio Magris to Seamus Heaney and Anthony Cronin reading (mostly) at Trinity Presbyterian Church on Summerhill North. The first runs from February 11th to the 13th, the second on February 19th and 20th.

Tom McCarthy, literature director at 2005, believes these 4 p.m. events will lead people on to other happenings in the city, so on February 20th one can leave Trinity Church, have a meal, and walk down to Figaro's Wedding at the Opera House. These will be the memorable linkages, the intimate architecture of enjoyment.

Intimate architecture will be available also for two weeks from February 15th at the Cork Museum, which curator Stella Cherry guarantees will be up and running next month. When 2005 plc rejected a proposal for an exhibition on the work of Victorian architect William Burges, creator of St Fin Barre's Cathedral, the project was retrieved by the Cork City Manager Joe Gavin.

The full, extensive (and, admittedly, expensive) plan involved sources such as the Victoria and Albert Museum and the National Museum of Wales, as well as several leading international Burges authorities (all of whom had expressed great interest). But a private benefactor came forward to fund the initial restoration of the cathedral's unique archive of casts and drawings.

Retained from the building of St. Fin Barre's in 1865 and hidden away in towers and basements, the plaster casts were made by stone-carver Thomas Nicholls to the designs of Burges. Often too high up for easy viewing, now they are to be revealed at last as plaster restorer Jason Ellis will be at work on a selection of them in a public demonstration of his craft and their beauty.

When Burges gave Cork his gothic fantasy of a cathedral, he left behind a full collection of coloured cartoons for the marvellous stained-glass windows and for the mosaics of the chancel. These, rescued from a chest in the cathedral's Library House by the then Dean, the late Maurice Carey, are also to be restored, and will be exhibited with the casts at the museum from October.

It is understood that later the cartoons are to be lodged in the post-graduate library now under construction at UCC, although as Ellis says, "a new, safe harbour for the casts has yet to be found". Also yet to be found is a sponsor for a complete Burges exposition, for which it is hoped that February's demonstration, and October's exhibition, are merely precursors.