June Over The Edge Writers’ Gathering with American poet Susan Rich and an Evening of African Poetry

 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, The Strangest of Theatres: Poets Crossing Borders (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 24^th, 6.30pm at St. Nicholas’s Church, Galway.

 

Over The Edge acknowledges the ongoing financial support of the Arts Council,

Poetry Ireland, and Galway City Council.  

Deirdre Hines, John Noonan, & Daniel Wade PLUS launch of issue 15 of Skylight 47 at January Over The Edge: Open Reading as Over The Edge Celebrates 19th Birthday on Zoom

The January ‘Over The Edge: Open Reading’ takes place on Zoom on Thursday, January 20^th  at the usual Over The Edge time 6.30-8.00pm (local Galway time). The Featured Readers are Daniel Wade, John Noonan, & Deirdre Hines. The evening will also see the launch, by Deirdre Hines, of issue fifteen of perhaps Ireland’s most exciting, informative, and accessible poetry magazine Skylight 47, edited by Bernie Crawford, Nicki Griffin, & Ruth Quinlan. There will be readings by contributors. This reading celebrates the nineteenth anniversary of the first ever Over The Edge reading in Galway City Library and there will be an online birthday party throughout, even possibly a birthday cake to celebrate the fact that Over The Edge is now (easily) old enough to legally drink whiskey, drive a car, or join the French Foreign Legion. The MC for the evening will be Susan Millar DuMars.

Deirdre Hines was born in Liverpool. She moved to Belfast shortly thereafter, and from there to Letterkenny in Co. Donegal, where she now lives. She has written several plays, of which “Howling Moons, Silent Sons” won the Stewart Parker Award fro Best New Play in 1992. Pigsback Theatre Company produced it. She went on to write “Ghost Acreage at Vixen Tine” for Passion Machine’s Songs of the Reaper Festival in 1994.Other plays include “A Moving Destiny”(1996) produced by Yew Theatre Company and “Dreamframe” produced for Fishamble’s “Y2K” Festival. She was short listed for the Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Award in 2010, and won the Listowel Poetry Collection in 2011. Her debut poetry collection The Language of Coats was published by New Island Press in 2012. New poems have appeared in Poetry Ireland Review, Abridged, Three Drops from a Cauldron, Boyne Berries, The Bombay Review, The Lake, Crannóg, Elsewhere, and The Journal of Intelligent Travel to name a few. Her poetry wards include  being longlisted in The Gregory O’Donohue Competition (2012), and in The Aryamati Poetry Prize (2019), and shortlisted in The Allingham Poetry Prize (2018 and 2019). She reviews poetry for Sabotage, Riggwelter, and the Dublin Review of Books.

John Noonan is a native of Longford and now lives near Dundalk and is a member of Dundalk Writers ; his work has been published in Poetry Ireland Review, Crannóg, Skylight 47, Revival Press, Drawn To the Light Press, Pinewood Review, and Poppy Road Review [USA.]  Boyne Berries, North West Words. His first play "Winter Window" was performed in 2018. John's poetry has also been included in some anthologies also shortlisted in many poetry competitions and was the winner of The Goldsmith International Poetry Competition.

Daniel Wade is a writer from Dublin, Ireland. He is the Hennessy New Irish Writing winner for April 2015 in The Irish Times. In January 2017, his play 'The Collector' was staged at the New Theatre, Dublin. His debut poetry collection Rapids was published by Finishing Line Press in August of 2021, whilst his novel A Land Without Wolves was published by Temple Dark Books in September. 

Over The Edge is inviting you to the January Over The Edge: Open Reading on Zoom. Thursday, January 20^th, 6.30-8pm

Join The Over The Edge Zoom Meeting at

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/7389013549

Meeting ID: 738 901 3549

The new issue (no. 15 of Skylight 47) will be launched by Deirdre Hines after the Featured Readers have finished. 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, Poetry Ireland & The Arts Council.

 

Over The Edge presents the Zoom launch by Grace Wells of issue 14 of Skylight 47 Thursday May 13th

 

On Thursday May 13^th, 6.30pm Over The Edge presents the Zoom launch of issue 14 of Skylight 47 “possibly Ireland's most interesting poetry publication”, edited by Bernie Crawford, Nicki Griffin, & Ruth Quinlan. The issue includes a wide range of poems, reviews of poetry collections, and a poetry master class in which an established poet makes detailed editing suggestions for a poem submitted to them anonymously. The launch will include readings by contributors of their poems and the issue will be launched by award-winning poet Grace Wells who will also read some of her own poems. 

Grace Wells was born in London in 1968, and moved to rural Tipperary in 1991. Nature, spirit of place and ecological concern have been large themes in her writing ever since the publication of her debut children’s novel Gyrfalcon (O’Brien Press, 2002), which won the Eilís Dillon Best Newcomer Award and was an International White Ravens Choice. Her debut poetry collection When God has been Called Away to Greater Things (Dedalus Press, 2010), won the Rupert and Eithne Strong Best First Collection Award, and was shortlisted for the London Festival Fringe New Poetry Award. With her second poetry collection Fur (Dedalus Press, 2015), Wells moved more deeply into eco-poetics and ecofeminism. Fur was lauded in Poetry Ireland Review as ‘a book that enlarges the possibilities of poetry’, and her poem Otter was Highly Commended by the Forward Prize. She has reviewed Irish poetry for a wide range of journals, and has taught and mentored emerging writers on behalf of Poetry Ireland, Words Ireland, and for many County Council Arts Offices. In 2018 Grace Wells moved to County Clare, which has informed her new work with a coastal, marine light. She is currently working on her third collection, Home, a meditation on belonging within culture, body, self and nature in our era of ecological crisis. The poems are accompanied by a sequence of eco-poetry-films, Wells’ Home Movies. 

 Join the Over The Edge Zoom meeting at

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/7389013549

Meeting ID: 738 901 3549

 6.30pm, Thurs, May 13^th

ALL WELCOME!

Make sure you have your copy of Skylight 47 for the launch by buying a copy in advance here https://skylight47poetry.wordpress.com/buy-skylight-47/

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, Poetry Ireland & The Arts Council.