This Saturday sees the publication of our second Hennessy New Irish Writing page, with a new short story and two new poems, hot on the heels of the awards ceremony on February 24th for the winners of last year’s competitions.
Eileen Battersby takes on Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Buried Giant and finds it a muddle wrapped in an enigma dunked in an allegory.
Sarah Gilmartin reviews Making Nice by Matt Sumell, “a confident debut with a strong and youthful voice”.
Mary Morrissy tackles creative writing courses, asking: why learn how to write? and answering: because it gets results.
Sara Keating’s ebooks column looks at how reclusive Japanese writer Haruki Murakami became an online agony uncle.
And there’s a new poem by Bernard O’Donoghue – The Republic.
Anna Carey reviews Girls Will be Girls by Emer O’Toole, a witty, engaging appeal for everybody to stop conforming so rigidly to gender stereotypes.
Ian Thomson reviews I’m Not Here to Give a Speech by Gabriel García Márquez, a collection of the Latin American author’s public speeches and “marvels of infectious charm and humanity”.
Brian Hayes MEP reviews Political Communication in the Republic of Ireland, edited by Mark O’Brien and Donnacha Ó Beacháin, “a good insight into politics for genuine hurlers on the ditch and for devotees of the black art”.
Former British MP Chris Mullin, meanwhile, reviews How Good We Can Be by Will Hutton, his follow-up 20 years on from The State We’re In, and finds it “a credible alternative social and economic policy to the one that has been the dominant narrative for the past 30 years”.
