Loose Leaves

Irish poet’s ‘Merman’wins Arvon competition

Jean O'Brien has won the Arvon International Poetry Competition, taking the £7,500 prize for her poem Merman.

The biennial competition, which was founded by Ted Hughes in 1980, drew thousands of entries this year from more than 40 countries. Previous winners include Andrew Motion and Don Paterson.

O'Brien, the author of three collections – The Shadow Keeper, Dangerous Dressesand Lovely Legs– is working on another. "All poets need to work, to have jobs, to keep body and soul together, and a big award like this helps you get more work, more readings, more teaching, more festival appearances," says O'Brien, mindful of the prize's link to Hughes. "I met him when he read in Dublin decades ago, when I was administrator in Poetry Ireland. He read in St Ann's Church on Dawson Street. I can still remember his commanding Yorkshire accent filling the church. I was young then, just starting out as a poet, and the thing I am glad about now is that I had the courage to go up and speak to him then, because he was very gracious and approachable even though lots of people were thronging him."

O’Brien has taught creative writing at the Irish Writers’ Centre in Dublin for 12 years, as well as tutoring in prisons, schools and community and writing groups.

The winning poems and the top runners-up will now be included in an anthology.

Bloomin’ heck, that Joyce read a lot of newspapers

Given its travails, the newspaper industry obviously needs more readers like James Joyce, who, after leaving Ireland as a young man, kept up with what was happening by reading its papers almost every day for the rest of his life.

The Joycean Luca Crispi writes about this lifelong habit of the writer in the latest issue of the Stinging Fly."He could always rely on newspapers to provide him not just with the news but also the sort of new and interesting words that he prized," even if it was just noting from the golf column in The Irish Timesthat "a ladies foursome tournament" was taking place in Ranelagh.

Crispi, who lectures at UCD, also notes a landmark date looming on the Joycean calendar. “After decades of restrictions that have shaped scholarship (including the content and form of this essay), the expiration of the Joyce Estate’s copyright on published (and some unpublished) works on January 1st, 2012 is getting ever closer. Dublin, this Unesco city of literature, will have the opportunity to reclaim one of its most critical citizens and exiles and then we will see what kinds of change this may bring about.” See stingingfly.org.

Rooney winner to judge O’Donoghue prize

Leanne O’Sullivan, winner of this year’s Rooney Prize for Irish Literature, is the judge for the second Gregory O’Donoghue poetry prize. O’Donoghue, who was born in Cork in 1951 and studied English at UCC under Sean Lucy and John Montague, was part of what Thomas Dillon Redshaw described as a remarkable generation; he died unexpectedly in 2005.

The overall winner receives €1,000 and, if they choose to travel to collect the prize, a trip to Cork worth another €1,000. The second prize is €500; the third €250. Ten others will receive honourable mention and €30. All of their entries will be published in Southword, of which O'Donoghue was poetry editor. The deadline for entries is December 15th. The winner will be announced in February. See munsterlit.ie.