Clare Pollard, Evelyn Parsons & Laurie Leech for August 'Over The Edge: Open Reading'

Clare Pollard

The August Over The Edge: Open Reading takes place in Galway City Library, St. Augustine Street, Galway on Thursday, August 25th, 6.30-8pm. The Featured Readers are Laurie Leech, Evelyn Parsons & Clare Pollard. The reading is sponsored by Poetry Ireland. The evening will also see the announcement of the shortlist in this year’s Over The Edge New Writer of The Year competition.

Laurie Leech is a Galway based poet. He is MC of the Testify! nights in Róisín Dubh, showcasing poets, musicians and anything else in between. Formerly MC of Poetry Smackdown, which was featured on RTE’s Arena. He took 2nd place in the 2011 Cúirt Poetry Grand Slam and 1st place in the 2011 Drogheda Fringe Poetry Slam. He puts his words to music sometimes and shared a bill with Buck 65, also during Cúirt 2011.

Evelyn Parsons says that she “stumbled down a creative writing shaped rabbit hole in 2010, landing heart first in a fiction wonderland of classes with Kevin Higgins and Susan Millar DuMars.” She was highly commended in the 2010 Over The Edge New Writer of The Year competition and short-listed for the 2011 Fish One Page Prize. Evelyn is also an avid reader and a member of the Ballinasloe Booksuckers Club.

Clare Pollard has published four collections of poetry with Bloodaxe Books, the most recent of which, Changeling, was published in June of this year. Her play The Weather (Faber, 2004) premiered at the Royal Court Theatre and has been performed at the Munchner Kammerspiele in Munich. Clare was Assistant Director of the Clerkenwell Literary Festival from 2002-5. She has scripted and presented two documentaries for televison, and her documentary for radio, ‘My Male Muse’, was a Radio 4 Pick of the year. Her short stories have been published in The Idler and the anthology Comma (Comma Press, 2002). She recently co-edited the Bloodaxe anthology Voice Recognition: 21 poets for the 21st Century. Clare is currently teaching for The City Lit, The Poetry School and the Arvon Foundation. This is Clare’s first time reading in Ireland.

There will be an open-mic when the Featured Readers have finished. This is open to anyone who has a poem or story to share. New readers are always especially welcome. The MC for the evening will be Susan Millar DuMars. For further details phone 087-6431748.

Over The Edge acknowledges the ongoing generous financial support of Galway City Council and The Arts Council and the sponsorship of this reading by Poetry Ireland.

2011 Over The Edge New Writer of The Year competition to be judged by Elaine Feeney

2011 Over The Edge New Writer of The Year competition

sponsored by Charlie Byrne’s Bookshop,

McGinn’s Bar,

 Niall Ó Brolcháin,

Senator Fidelma Healy Eames

& Mike Cubbard

In 2011 Over The Edge is continuing its exciting annual creative writing competition. The competition is open to both poets and fiction writers. The total prize money is €1,000. The best fiction entry will win €300. The best poetry entry will win €300. One of these will then be chosen as the overall winner and will receive an additional €400, giving the overall winner total prize money of €700 and the title Over The Edge New Writer of The Year 2011. The 2011 Over The Edge New Writer of The Year will be a Featured Reader at a reading to be scheduled in Galway City Library in Winter 2011/12. Salmon Poetry will read, with no commitment to publish, a manuscript submitted to them by the winner in the poetry category.

Entries should be sent to Over The Edge, New Writer of the Year competition, 3 Carbry Road, Newcastle, Galway, Ireland with an accompanying SAE. Entries will be judged anonymously, so do not put your name on your poem(s) or story. Put your contact details on a separate sheet.

Criteria: fiction of up to three thousand words, three poems of up to forty lines, or one poem of up to one hundred lines. Multiple entries are acceptable but each must be accompanied by a fee. The fee for one entry is €10. The fee for multiple entries is €7.50 per entry e.g. two entries will cost €15, three entries €22.50 and so on. Fee payable by cheque or money order to Over The Edge. To take part you must be at least sixteen years old by September 1st 2011 and not have a book published or accepted for publication in that genre. Chapbooks excepted. Entries must not have been previously published or be currently entered in any other competition.

The closing date is Wednesday, August 3rd, 2011. A longlist will be announced in Charlie Byrne’s Bookshop on Saturday, August 20th, 2011. A shortlist will be announced at the Over The Edge: Open Reading in Galway City Library on Thursday, August 25th. The winners will be announced at the Over The Edge reading in Galway City Library on Thursday, September 29th, 2011.

This year’s competition judge is Elaine Feeney. Elaine was born in Galway in 1979. In 2006 she won the North Beach Nights Grand Slam and in 2008 won the Cúirt Festival's Poetry Grand Slam. Elaine has performed at many venues including The Edinburgh Fringe Festival, The Electric Picnic, The Vilenica Festival and The Cúirt International Festival of Literature. Her work has been translated into Slovene. Elaine lives in Athenry with her partner Ray, and sons, Jack and Finn. Her first full collection of poetry Where’s Katie? was published last year by Salmon poetry.

Elaine Feeney

For further details contact Over The Edge on 087-6431748,

e-mail over-the-edge-openreadings@hotmail.com

Inisbofin Writing Jaunt with Yvonne Cullen

For details of this year's Inisbofin Writing Jaunts (September 2nd-5th & September 9th-12th) with renowned poet and creative writing teacher Yvonne Cullen, see here
http://yvonnecullen.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/inishbofinjaunt-brochureonline1.pdf

Summer Open-Mic at Westside Library

Over The Edge in association with Westside Arts Festival presents the 2011 Over The Edge Summer Open-mic and the launch of Monday Miscellany, a collection of stories, poems and memoir by the Westside Writers and at Westside Library, Seamus Quirke Road on Tuesday, July 19th.

Monday Miscellany will be launched by Galway City Council’s Arts Officer, James Harrold, at 5.30pm.

The annual Over The Edge Summer Open-mic will follow immediately at 6.30pm. Everyone who has a poem or story to share is most welcome to take part. So, if you have some writing you’d like to read to an audience. This is your opportunity to do so.

The MCs for the evening will be Kevin Higgins & Susan Millar DuMars. All are welcome to attend.

Over The Edge acknowledges the financial support of the Arts Council and Galway City Council.