LET’ S SHARE A MILLION STORIES, SAYS WORLD BOOK DAY To kick off the New Year and get ready to celebrate World Book Day 2020 (Thursday 5 March), the charity behind the biggest celebration of books and reading is calling on the nation to get involved in an unprecedented mass super-share – and SHARE A MILLION STORIES. Building on the phenomenal success of the Share a Story campaign, now entering its third year, the super...

Closing date for application: 20th January 2020. The Leuven Centre for Irish Studies (LCIS) offers a grant to four writers per year to be Writer in Residence: two in spring (March-April), two in autumn (October-November). We offer a quiet room in an inspiring city, with ample time and space to get some work done. We also hope that the strong Irish tradition in Leuven will allow for familiarity while in a new city. Our Irish...

The Society of Authors has announced the 2020 shortlists for the Imison Award for the best original script by a new writer, and the Tinniswood Award for the best audio drama script of the year. This year’s shortlistees for the 2020 Imison Award include rapper and beatboxer Testament, South African author Colette Victor and poet and pub singer Vicky Foster. The award is presented annually and honours the best original script broadcast in the UK...

Award-winning screenwriter, Jeb Stuart, is to host a masterclass in writing action movies at the Irish Film Institute. Jeb Stuart is the screenwriter responsible for, amongst others, Die Hard and The Fugitive. Using clips from his blockbusting classics, he will explore the process of mapping twists, creating charismatic characters and crafting memorable lines. Don’t miss this rare opportunity to hear from a master of his discipline. Don’t miss this rare opportunity to hear from a...

The Society of Authors has today announced seven shortlists for its annual Translation Prizes. Sharing in a total prize fund worth almost £20,000, the winners will be announced in a ceremony at The British Library Knowledge Centre on Wednesday 12 February 2020. The thirty-five shortlisted works, translated from nine languages, were described by the judges as ‘vivid’, ‘intense’, ‘compelling’, and ‘seeming to accomplish the impossible’. They are stunning translations into English from German, French, Spanish,...

Boundless and Bare, the Irish Spoken Word Agency, have announced the release of Issue Two of the BND Spoken Word Magazine. BND is the only spoken word magazine in Ireland, that documents the Irish spoken word scene as it exists and evolves, cultivating content with the help of contributors from around the country writing about spoken word communities, submitting essays, articles, reviews, and interviews. In the magazine, Boundless and Bare have covered a large portion of...

The Department of Business, Enterprise and Innovation is seeking the views of stakeholders and interested parties on the transposition of EU Directive 2019/790 into Irish law. Directive 2019/790 (hereinafter “the Copyright Directive”) was published by the European Commission in September 2016 as part of a series of legislative proposals under the Digital Single Market strategy.  The Directive provides a framework for the creation of modern European copyright legislation to take account of technological developments in...

Competition deadline: 30th November 2019 For the opportunity to have your short story published in the Fish Anthology 2020, enter the Fish Short Story Prize. Ten stories will be selected for publication. The Fish Short Story Prize was started in 1994, and has become an established event on the literary calendar. Previous judges, Roddy Doyle and Colum McCann are honorary patrons. (Past honorary patrons were Frank McCourt and Dermot Healy). This year’s judge, acclaimed short story writer, novelist and...

Are you an entrepreneur, culture vulture, or community group? Join a Spot-lit workshop this month in Galway, Mayo or Sligo to discover how to create new products for the untapped literary tourism market in the West of Ireland and bring even more tourists to your region. Spot-lit, a new EU Funded innovation programme, will shine a light on literary tourism over the next three years, with a focus on developing new literary tourism products or...

The An Post Irish Book Awards 2019 take place on Wednesday 20th November. The shortlists feature a diverse mix of exceptional writing from new and established writers across sixteen categories, including Novel of the Year, Children’s, Cookery, Crime Fiction, Popular Fiction, Nonfiction, Sports, Short Story, Poetry, Teen and Young Adult and Irish Language. The An Post Irish Book Awards celebrate and promote Irish writing to the widest range of readers possible. Each year it brings...