Starting in February Over The Edge
is offering aspiring poets worldwide a ten week online poetry workshop with poet
Kevin Higgins. Kevin is co-organiser of Over The Edge
literary events in Galway. He has published five full collections of poems: The
Boy With No Face (2005), Time Gentlemen, Please (2008), Frightening
New Furniture (2010), The Ghost In The Lobby (2014), &
Sex and Death at Merlin Park Hospital
(2019). His poems also feature in Identity Parade – New British and
Irish Poets (Bloodaxe, 2010) and in The Hundred Years’ War: modern war poems
(Ed Neil Astley, Bloodaxe May 2014). Kevin was satirist-in-residence with the
alternative literature website The Bogman’s Cannon 2015-16. 2016 – The
Selected Satires of Kevin Higgins was published by NuaScéalta in 2016. The Minister For Poetry Has Decreed was published
by Culture Matters (UK) also in 2016. Song of Songs 2:0 – New & Selected Poems was published
by Salmon in Spring 2017. Kevin is a highly experienced workshop facilitator
and several of his students have gone on to achieve publication success. He has
facilitated poetry workshops at Galway Arts Centre and taught Creative Writing
at Galway Technical Institute for the past fifteen years. Kevin is the Creative
Writing Director for the NUI Galway International Summer School and also
teaches on the NUIG BA Creative Writing Connect programme. He has published
topical political poems in publications as various as The New European, The Morning
Star, Dissent Magazine (USA), Village Magazine (Ireland), & Harry’s Place. The Stinging Fly
magazine has described Kevin as “likely the most widely read living poet in
Ireland”. One of Kevin’s poems features in A
Galway Epiphany, the final instalment of Ken Bruen’s Jack Taylor series of
novels which is just published. His work has been broadcast on RTE Radio, Lyric FM, and BBC Radio 4. His
book The Colour Yellow & The Number
19: Negative Thoughts That
Helped One Man Mostly Retain His Sanity During 2020 is just published by
Nuascealta. Kevin’s sixth
full poetry collection, Ecstatic, was published by Salmon in June.
A collection of Kevin’s essays and book reviews, Mentioning The War,
was published by Salmon Poetry in 2012. Kevin’s poetry has been translated into
Greek, Spanish, Turkish, Italian, Japanese, Russian, French, Albanian, & Portuguese. The Ghost in The Lobby, was published in February
2014, also by Salmon. In 2014 Kevin's poetry was the subject of a paper 'The Case of Kevin Higgins, or, 'The Present State of Irish Poetic Satire' presented by David Wheatley at a Symposium on Satire at the University of Aberdeen. '2016 - The Selected Satires of Kevin Higgins' was published by NuaScéalta in early 2016. A pamphlet of Kevin’s
political poems The Minister For Poetry
Has Decreed was published in December 2016 by the Culture Matters imprint of
the UK based Manifesto Press; Song of Songs 2:0 - New and Selected Poems was published by Salmon in April 2017. His poems have been praised by, among others,
Tony Blair’s biographer John Rentoul, Observer
columnist Nick Cohen, historian Ruth Dudley Edwards, and Sunday
Independent columnist Gene Kerrigan; been quoted in The Daily Telegraph, The Independent, The Daily Mirror, Hot Press magazine, Phoenix magazine, and on Tonight with Vincent Browne; and read aloud by film director Ken Loach at a political meeting in London. The Stinging Fly magazine described Kevin as "likely the most read living poet in Ireland."
workshop facilitator Kevin Higgins
Each of the ten weeks Kevin will email participants
a poetry writing exercise for the following week and participants will submit
one of their poems to Kevin for constructive criticism. Kevin will work with
participants on making each of their poems the best possible poem it can be.
Kevin is a highly experienced workshop
facilitator and several of his students have gone on to achieve publication
success. He has facilitated poetry workshops at Galway Arts Centre for the past
twelve years. One of his workshop participants won the prestigious Hennessy
Award for New Irish Poetry; two have been shortlisted for the Shine/Strong Award for Best First Collection by an Irish poet; two have won the Cúirt New Writing Prize; and
another the Cúirt Poetry Grand Slam; several have published collections
of their poems with reputable publishers.
Kevin is the Creative Writing Director of the NUI Galway International Summer School and teaches poetry on the NUIG BA Creative Writing Connect programme. Kevin is co-organiser of the
successful Over The Edge: Open Reading series which specialises in promoting
new writers.
This workshop
works via private Facebook group & group email and is PARTICULARLY suitable for continuing and aspiring poets
across ALL time zones.
The workshop will run for ten weeks,
commencing Wednesday, 8th February 2023. The
cost to participants is €110. There are no refunds. The
workshop will be conducted in English only. THIS
WORKSHOP WILL BE LIMITED TO 30 REGISTERED PARTICIPANTS, SO IF YOU WANT TO ENSURE
A PLACE YOU SHOULD BOOK NOW.
For queries, email over-the-edge-openreadings@hotmail.com
YOU CAN REGISTER ONLINE NOW