It sometimes feels like we’ve run out of stories, and the only option is to return to what was said before

Hungarian auteur’s new film Sunset shows a vanished Budapest on the edge of change

People who travel back into their own past may come among us as strangers

Sergei and Yulia Skripal’s poisoner delivered neurotoxin via air conditioning in victim’s car

The Scottish novelist on being a thorn in the literary establishment’s side

An extraordinary, powerful debut that looks at the aftermath of a rape

The Irish born academic and former US ambassador to the UN on how she became one of the most powerful women in American foreign affairs, her thoughts on the current president and how her roots are firmly in Ireland

The poet, who died 150 years ago this week, retains significant influence and allure

Many are cemented to old-fashioned mindsets on ageing, unable to respond to its new realities

Greece Letter: Various announcements about progress merely public charades

Banned priest: ‘It’s all falling apart so fast; it’s collapsing rapidly. Some say it’s too late’

Relief as contemporary Irish poet appears but teacher queries range required

Seán Flanagan is delighted and exhausted after two days of writing like a maniac

London Letter: Over 90% of books are on shelves, offering endless hours of browsing

Michael Dervan: Two evenings of music and words as part of Ireland 2016 got me thinking about the links that were missed

An insider’s story of a devastating modern war told from the perspective of 45 objects

The NCH’s centenary celebrations continue with a night of high calibre one-off performances

In ‘Vertigo’, the writer highlights familiar worlds as they are about to fracture

It was time for Vinny to seek sanctuary in a caravan bolt-hole in Curracloe

The festival needs its own dedicated venue, and its director’s pursuit of one might be about to bear fruit

As even the hostile critic FR Leavis conceded, in Yeats’s poetry ‘there is no element of a man’s experience in the twentieth century that, of its nature, it excludes’

The countdown is on to find Ireland’s favourite Irish poem, so we’ve asked a selection of writers and readers to tell us their favourite few lines of verse, and to nominate which poem they think is best from RTÉ’s A Poem for Ireland shortlist

At the Pendulum Summit in Dublin, delegates heard inspiring stories of change and re-invention

The band want to bring back the fine art of loafing, along with a few more serious concerns

Centenary of the birth of the Welsh poet, who ‘manages to juxtapose the sonorous tones of the pulpit with the intimate squeak of a mouse’

The audience and the city had important roles to play in this year’s festival, closing the gap between reality and fiction

Salmond says Burns would vote Yes, but living writers are not all on the same page

St Flannan’s is a challenging acoustic for musicians; here their solution is an energetic approach

Dean Victor Griffin

April

Up to 35,000 attend Galway street carnival

Help the writer deliver the best play possible. Get the basics right early. Do very little for a successful show, then claim the credit. Welcome to the tricks of the dramaturg’s trade

Opinion: Does the West want regime change to put Islamists in power in Damascus?

The Lloyd Webber musical is best embraced with a child’s willingness to accept the stunning weirdness of this feline underworld

John Amis - born June 17th, 1922; died August 1st, 2013

The brittle genius of Zelda Fitzgerald shines through in this exploration of her husband’s masterpiece