A Better Locksmith is a landmark anthology by the respected, Belfast-based arts journalist and critic Jane Coyle, which represents her coverage of Northern Ireland theatre over a period of four decades.
“I want to be a writer”.
These are words I repeated many times over the years, in response to the same question from a variety of family members, friends, teachers and career advisors. All were well meaning people, genuinely interested in my plans for the future, but their unanimous response to my unwavering reply ranged from blank faces to raised eyebrows and kind nods, and, in the latter case, the suggestion that I might join the diplomatic service, given my natural flair for languages.
There is no given route for a navigating a career as a writer. In my experience, it is a case of trial and error, endeavouring to be in the right place at the right time – wherever, whatever and whenever that may be – making the most of every potential opportunity. And writing, writing, always writing.
Faber & Faber
In 1973, newly graduated with a degree in French and English, I had no practical skills to my name. But an uninspiring bilingual secretarial course gave me fluency in shorthand and typing, together with the shaky confidence to apply for an advertised job as an editorial assistant at the London publishing house of Faber & Faber.
With scant expectation of success, I arrived in Bloomsbury’s Queen Square on a hot July afternoon After a long, nervous wait in the sunshine, I was recalled and offered the position by my future boss, a sober, elderly man called Alan Pringle. Little did I realise that he was one of the most respected editors in the business and that his leading author was Lawrence Durrell. At the interview, he had asked who was my favourite author. My prompt reply, “Durrell, Lawrence”, seemed, in the moment, to be unfavourably received but, as it it turned out, it was a good call.
From the off, I found myself on a steep learning curve, but my time at Faber, working on high quality writing for a meticulous and exacting editor, making lifelong friendships in the literary world, was a heaven-sent grounding for an aspiring young writer.
‘Pringled’!
There, I acquired an unexpected talent for writing blurbs, working to tight word counts and deadlines, honing a sharp eye for detail, adhering to strict house rules regarding spelling, grammar, punctuation and the precise, appropriate use of words. In Faber-speak, a manuscript which had been edited by Alan Pringle – or an assistant who had worked alongside him – was deemed to have been ‘Pringled’. Over the years, this treasured epithet has stood me in very good stead.
Family matters called me home, long before my time. Leaving London was hard but new opportunities beckoned. The Cardiff-based Western Mail, the acknowledged national newspaper of Wales, was an influential cornerstone of Thomson Regional Newspapers’ portfolio. In a freelance capacity, I started writing features and profiles about the arts, travel and cultural affairs, experiencing the thrill of seeing my by-line in print for the first time – a pleasure I retain to this day.
The Stage
While living in Cardiff, I was commissioned by The Stage to write reviews of theatre and dance events around South Wales. It is the oldest, London-based bible of the theatre industry and a publication to which I remain a regular contributor, covering productions across Ireland.
While working as a publicity and press officer in the tourism industry, I was approached by Derrik Mercer, then managing editor of The Sunday Times during the heady days of Harry Evans’s editorship and the imminent Murdoch acquisition. He invited me to write sections for its publications, including The Sunday Times Book of the Countryside and 1,000 Days Out in Britain. After moving to Belfast in 1982, I continued with that work.
In 1984, I set out on what would be a long and hugely fulfilling immersion in Northern Ireland’s performing arts sector, thereby coming full circle from my extended childhood stays in Stratford-upon-Avon. For many years, my great-aunt had been the head receptionist at the town’s Shakespeare Hotel, where visiting artists regularly stayed. A stalwart of the RSC’s artistic circle, she instilled in me – and my mother before me – a deep love of the performing arts, together with profound respect for its gifted, hard-working practitioners.
The Irish Times
After several productive years as a freelance feature writer for one of the Belfast morning papers, The Irish News, I was contacted by Fergus Linehan, the arts editor of The Irish Times in Dublin. He commissioned me to write a significant birthday interview with the actor Ian McElhinney. I had always regarded ‘The Times’ as one of the best newspapers in the world. Almost forty years later, my close association with it still flourishes.
As a teenager, I avidly read theatre and dance reviews by critics like Harold Hobson, Cyril Connolly and Kenneth Tynan. I had never seen – and probably never would see – the productions concerned, but they were such vivid pieces of writing. I longed to be able to be able to write in their style and on similar subjects – maybe even in a professional capacity – but, it was a pipe dream, surely?
A Better Locksmith
Out of thousands of arts and culture-related features, interviews, reviews and news stories I have since written for publications and media platforms across Ireland, the UK and Europe, Yellow House Publishing invited me to publish a small selection in a forthcoming book, subsequently entitled A Better Locksmith.
Its title is taken from Tynan’s first column for The Observer newspaper:
“Critics in the past have seen themselves variously as torch-bearers, pallbearers and lighthouses shining over unmapped seas; I see myself predominantly as a lock. If the key, which is the work of art, fits snugly into my mechanism of bias and preference, I click and rejoice; if not, I am helpless, and can only offer the artist the address of a better locksmith”.
The carefully chosen 66 items constitute a personal overview of some four decades of covering theatre in Northern Ireland. It represents an ongoing journey of discovery by a writer, who, even after all these years, continues to regard herself as an impartial observer, an objective outsider and, hopefully, a better locksmith.
David Grant
In his generous, insightful foreword, theatre director and former Queen’s University Belfast drama lecturer David Grant sets out what he considers to be the book’s most useful asset:
“Perhaps this book’s greatest importance lies in its first two decades, in the way it captures a picture of work that is at risk of disappearing from view, as our understanding of cultural history becomes ever more dependent on artificial intelligence. Anyone who has experimented with these emergent AI platforms will have noticed that they often deny the existence of anything that happened before the 21st century, even when one knows and protests loudly that these things happened, because we lived through them.
“As a freelancer, Jane has enjoyed a wide variety of platforms for her writing, and many [of them] are now difficult to access. All of us committed to preserving the memory of our theatre heritage are indebted, therefore, to this valuable compendium of Jane Coyle’s work as journalist, as advocate and as critical friend”.
(c) Jane Coyle
Author photograph (c) Mariusz Śmiejek
About A Better Locksmith:
A Better Locksmith (2026) is a landmark anthology by the respected, Belfast based arts journalist and critic Jane Coyle, which represents her coverage of Northern Ireland theatre over a period of four decades.
This wide-ranging selection of previews and reviews, news features and personal profiles begins in 1984 and ends in 2025. It charts the evolution and development of the theatre sector in Northern Ireland during more than forty years of conflict, social and political change and financial pressures.Events, festivals, international partnerships and individual career paths are recorded with clarity, insight and humanity, from the viewpoint of a self-confessed ‘objective observer’.
As a freelance writer, Coyle’s work has been published on many media platforms, some of which are now difficult to access The pieces reproduced here were originally published in The Irish News, The Irish Times, The Stage, The Sunday Tribune, The Sunday Times, Irish Theatre Magazine, Theatre Ireland and Culture Northern Ireland.
Order your copy online here.
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