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West Cork Literary Festival
Note: Details below refer to the previous event. Updated information for this year will be published here as soon as it becomes available.
2008 is the 10th anniversary of this festival and the occasion will be marked with a series of new events and the addition of an extra day.
Events get underway with the Festival launch, which will be performed by journalist, screenwriter and television producer Senator Eoghan Harris. Highlights over the following days include Monday night's appearance by Joseph O'Connor; Jennifer Johnston in conversation with John Waters at lunch time on Tuesday; Morse and Me, a talk by Colin Dexter; an evening with poet Paul Durcan and the keynote lecture "Poetry and War", which will be delivered by Micheal Thorsnes.
Twelve wrting workshops for adults cover a wide range of genres, including The Thriller, Writing for the Big Screen, The Novel, The Short Story, Poetry, Writing for Women, Writing for the Stage and Songwriting and a sure to be popular Masterclass with Colum McCann.
The Children’s Programme is very strong, with five-day Workshops aimed at ages from 4 to14, which have been thoughtfully timed so that parents can attend other events while they are on. For the first time there will a Reading every afternoon of the festival by a different children’s author.
Readings are a continuing and popular feature at Bantry, held at 11.00 each day in Bantry Bookshop, and twice daily at 13.00 and 17.00 in Bantry Library, with free admission. Every night the post festival action moves to the Festival Club, which this year is based at the Organice Cafe, where a range of light hearted events will take place.
Authors' Favourite Books
Some interesting questions have been asked by the festival organisers of visiting writers this year, and 10 of them, Jospeh O'Connor, Paul Durcan, Colum McCabe, Dervla Murphy, Jennifer Johnston, Carlo Gebler, John Waters, Arthur Matthews, Deirdre Purcell and Michael Collins will reveal who their favourite author is and what is the best book they ever read. Interesting idea, but probably impossibly fuid questions to answer, since favourites change so easily with both mood and time.
The festival is centered around Bantry, which is in easy reach of both West Cork and Kerry for those combining the festival with some local touring.
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What else to do in Cork?
For a look at some other activities and attractions that we recommend within reach of this event, including tour itineraries and articles of interest, see our South Area Guide.
