Loose Leaves

A literary roundup

The state of the nation in the city of literature

Nothing less than the state of the nation will be debated at the Dublin Book Festival next month. What the new government should be doing at that point to save our economy will be debated by Mark Little, Shane Coleman, Justine McCarthy, Ken Foxe and Stephen Kinsella on March 3rd, World Book Day, which falls during the five-day event. There will also be a public forum hosted by broadcaster Ryan Tubridy and historian Diarmaid Ferriter on the lessons Ireland can learn from its history, and a debate on the need for political reform with Fintan O’Toole, Pat Leahy, Naoise Nunn and Kevin Rafter.

Appropriately, now that the capital is a Unesco City of Literature, Dublin’s place in the literary world is the topic for the opening session on March 2nd, featuring writers Dermot Bolger and Anthony Cronin and Irish Times journalist Eileen Battersby.

Paul Howard (creator of Ross O’Carroll-Kelly), Peter Sirr, Gerard Smyth, Iggy McGovern, Jessie Lendennie, Alan Jude Moore, Máighréad Medbh, Maurice Harmon, Éilís Ní Dhuibhne, Christine Dwyer Hickey, Kevin Power and Claire Kilroy are among the cast of festival participants.

Sarah Webb and Kevin Stevens will discuss writing for young adults, while anyone interested in writing popular fiction can get tips from Sheila O’Flanagan, Sinéad Moriarty and Anna McPartlin.

The festival will centre on City Hall on Dame Street, where entry is free. A number of other events will take place elsewhere in the city centre. For further details, see dublinbookfestival.com.

Dublin’s most hospitable poet and patriot

The unveiling of a plaque on his house at 3 Clare Street, Dublin, on Wednesday, March 2nd, at 12.30pm, is one of a number of upcoming events to honour George Sigerson (1836-1925), a man of many parts, including the ultimate Irish accolade: a mention in the work of James Joyce. Eminent in medicine, science, literature and politics, he features in the National Library episode of Ulysses: “Our national epic has yet to be written, Dr Sigerson says.”

Among the artefacts Sigerson had in his Clare Street house were a rare photograph of John Mitchel, for which Sigerson persuaded him to pose, and the death mask of Charles Kickham, which Sigerson, his physician, moulded on the day he died.

People who frequented Clare Street in its heyday included John O’Leary, Cathal Brugha, Pádraig Pearse and Roger Casement. The house was the Sigerson family residence for 40 years. The Sunday-evening gatherings there were so legendary that a correspondent from the English Daily Chronicle described Sigerson as “the most hospitable man in Dublin – which is to say much”.

Sigerson, who taught himself Irish, translated old Irish poems, resulting in the publication of The Poets and Poetry of Munster (1860) and the monumental Bards of the Gael and Gall (1897). Other publications included History of the Land Tenures and Land Classes of Ireland (1871), Political Prisoners at Home and Abroad (1890)and The Last Independent Parliament of Ireland (1918).

Also on March 2nd the book George Sigerson: Poet, Patriot, Scientist and Scholar, by Ken McGilloway, will be launched at the National Library. Sigerson is also the subject of a portrait by John B Yeats, which is held in the library. On the sporting front he presented the Sigerson Cup for inter-varsity Gaelic football in 1911. The centenary Sigerson Cup at UCD takes place in the same week as the plaque unveiling and book launch.