The June Over The Edge Writers’ Gathering takes place at St. Nicholas’s Church, Galway on Friday, June 24th at 6.30pm. The event will also be broadcast on Facebook live. The event features visiting American poet Susan Rich and an Evening of African poetry with Nandi Jola, Adedotun Adekeye, Bernie Crawford, & Chiamaka Enyi-Amadi.
Nandi Jola, a South African born poet, storyteller and playwright at Smock Alley Theatre, Rachel Baptiste 2022 programme.She was a creative writing facilitator for Ulster University's Books Beyond Boundaries NI in 2021, Poetry Ireland in 2022. Her one woman play ‘The Journey’ opened the International Literature Festival, Dublin, in October, 2020. She represented Northern Ireland at the Transpoesie Poetry Festival in Brussels 2021 and is a commissioned poet for Poetry Jukebox, participating in 'Ambiguities', a James Joyce programme of the Centre Culturel Irlandais in Paris 2022. She is currently studying for her MA in Poetry at Queen’s University, Belfast, and her book Home is Neither Here Nor There, which is her debut poetry collection, just got published by Doire Press.
Born in Lagos, Nigeria, Chiamaka Enyi-Amadi is a writer, performer and arts facilitator based in Wicklow. She is a commissioned poet on the Poetry as Commemoration project run by the Irish Poetry Reading Archive in UCD under the Decade of Centenaries 2012-2023 programme. Her poetry film is being screened in the ongoing Words at Wilton Park programme and is among the official selection of the 2022 Bloomsday Film Festival. She was selected for the Screen Ireland 2021 X-Pollinator Programme and her short story was longlisted for the 2020 An Post Short Story of the Year Award. Her work is widely published, notedly in The Art of the Glimpse: 100 Irish Short Stories anthology (ed. Sinéad Gleeson). She is co-editor of Writing Home: The ‘New Irish’ Poets anthology (Dedalus Press, 2019). She is working on her debut poetry collection. Find her on Instagram/Twitter @AmadiEnyi
Adedotun Adekeye (Ade), a Nigerian that has been living in Ireland for over 14 years. He had a poem published in the first edition of Skylight 47 and was a featured reader at Over the Edge, some years ago. He is a Drama facilitator, skilled in Forum Theatre methodology and a Storyteller. He also a freelance facilitator in Development Education.
Bernie Crawford, originally from County Limerick, lives near the sea in Co Galway. Her poetry has been published in Irish and international journals and anthologies and in 2021 her first full collection, Living Water, was published by Chaffinch Press. She was the winner of New Irish Writing in the Irish Times in January 2020, the North West Words 2019 poetry competition and 2017 Poetry Ireland/Trocaire competition. She was placed second in the 2018 Blue Nib Summer Chapbook Contest and a chapbook with a selection of her poetry was published by the Blue Nib. In 2019 she was awarded a bursary by Galway County Council to work towards a debut collection. Bernie is a co-editor of the popular poetry magazine Skylight 47. She lived for many years in Lesotho and Zambia.
Born and raised in Boston, Massachusetts, Susan Rich earned a B.A. from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, a M.Ed. from Harvard University, and an M.F.A. from the University of Oregon. Rich’s poems reflect on her years lived outside the United States as an international human rights worker, as well as including a more personal focus on family and loss. Rich is the author of five books of poetry: “Gallery of Postcards and Maps: New and Selected Poems” (Salmon, 2022), “Cloud Pharmacy” (2014), “The Alchemist’s Kitchen” (2010), “Cures Include Travel” (2006) and “The Cartographer’s Tongue / Poems of the World” (2000). Susan also co-edited the travel anthology, (2013). Her book, “Blue Atlas”will be published by Red Hen Press in 2024. With poet Kelli Russell Agodon, she is co-founder of Poets on the Coast: A Writing Retreat for Women, now in its eleventh year. Susan has taught at the University of Cape Town (SA), the Antioch MFA Program, and the University of Oregon, and is currently tenured faculty at Highline College, outside Seattle. Her work has earned awards from PEN USA, the Fullbright Foundation and the Times Literary Supplement (London). She can be found online at www.poetsusanrich.com.
The MC for the evening will be Kevin Higgins. There is no cover charge. All are welcome to attend. Friday, June 24th, 6.30pm at St. Nicholas’s Church, Galway.
Over The Edge acknowledges the ongoing financial support of the Arts Council,