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Podcast: Can Literature Solve Poverty

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Podcast: Can Literature Solve Poverty

Last week I did an event at the LSE for the Royal Society of Literature with academic Dr Aaron Reeves and novelist Kit de Waal. We read from our work and talked about literature and working class lives. You can listen to it here.

Common People, Kit’s anthology of working class writers to which I’m contributing is now 90% funded with Unbound.

The Good Son 3rd Editon

Buy Here

Winner of The Polari Prize
“Pungently funny and shot through with streaks of aching sadness.” Patrick Gale
“I devoured it in a day, but I’ve thought about it for many, many more.” Lisa McInerney
“Funny, raw and endlessly entertaining.” Johnathan Coe

 

Event on Poverty for Royal Society of Literature

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Can Literature Solve Poverty?

Hosted by LSE “Beveridge 2.0” and the Royal Society of Literature

Poverty RSL

“In the run up to the LSE Festival: Beveridge 2.0, rethinking the welfare state for the 21st Century, we bring together a panel to discuss the relationship between literature and poverty. They reflect on questions such as: do you need money to access literature? If not, why are there comparatively few working-class writers? And can literature actively play a part in reducing financial hardship?”

I’ll be sharing the stage with Kit de Waal again – we had a wonderful time at Le Livres sur les Quais in Morges, Switzerland, last year. Kit mentioned The Good Son in her article for the Guardian on working class literature this weekend. Kit also commissioned me for the Common People anthology currently 75% funded on Unbounders. I can’t wait.

The Good Son 3rd Editon

Buy Here

Winner of The Polari Prize
“Pungently funny and shot through with streaks of aching sadness.” Patrick Gale
“I devoured it in a day, but I’ve thought about it for many, many more.” Lisa McInerney
“Funny, raw and endlessly entertaining.” Johnathan Coe

Writers in Conversation, Southampton

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Writers in Conversation

Free Event!

I’ll be the Writer in Conversation filling the very large shoes of writers like Helen MacDonald and Jennifer Egan. It takes place in Southampton on Feb 19th. Know anyone in those parts? Please share.

You can check out the Facebook events page here.

Date & Time: Monday, February 19 at 7 PM – 9 PM

Venue: John Hansard Gallery, Gallery, Studio 144, 142-144 Above Bar Street, SO14

The Good Son 3rd Editon

Buy Here

Winner of The Polari Prize
“Pungently funny and shot through with streaks of aching sadness.” Patrick Gale
“I devoured it in a day, but I’ve thought about it for many, many more.” Lisa McInerney
“Funny, raw and endlessly entertaining.” Johnathan Coe

27, June: International Conference on the Short Story in English, Lisbon

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The 15th International Conference on the Short Story in English will take place from June 27-30, 2018 at the University of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal with the theme: “Beyond History: The Radiance of the Short Story.”

I’ll be reading on Wednesday 27 June at 3.30pm alongside Maria Teresa Horta and Angelo Lacuesta.

Some writer friends going to… Hisham Bustani, Robert Olen Butler, Rebekah Clarkson, Evelyn Conlon, Lucy Durneen, Nancy Freund, Sandra Jensen, Alison Lock, Alan McMonagle, Mary Morrissy, Billy O’Callaghan, Nuala O’Connor, Judith Nika Pfeifer, Anna Solding, Billie Travalini, Jose Varghese and William Wall.

“In an age when private lives appear to be ruled by the force of historical events, we are contradictorily challenged by creative achievements that, even if originating in History, develop a self-sustainable energy, a radiance, so to say, that supersedes material circumstances and/or envisages alternatives for them.

The 15th International Conference on the Short Story in English brings writers of many nationalities to Lisbon, a city where the cultures of the world meet and stories of history unravel around every corner. In this scenario, fiction writers in English, or authors who have been translated into English, together with scholars of the short story, will join in reading sessions, roundtable discussions and panels, as well as in the more traditional paper presentation sessions.

In celebration of the 30th anniversary of the foundation of the Society for the Study of the Short Story, the Conference looks forward to the opportunity of highlighting the variety of ways in which the Short Story becomes a specific form, blurs the boundaries with other literary forms, goes beyond the written medium and borrows from other artistic processes/languages, shaping itself anew in an endless process. Indeed, proving to be an extremely resilient medium, the Short Story has been changing throughout the times and aesthetic tendencies, without losing the kernel that makes it a distinctive mode of the human expressive genius.”

You can check out my online short story course with Writers Victoria here.

Hope to see some of you there.

Huge thanks to Culture Ireland for supporting this trip.

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PaulMcVeigh short story

Interviewing Anne Enright in London

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Last year I had the honour of sharing the stage with Anne Enright at Le Livre Sur les Quais in Switzerland last year. This St Patrick’s Eve I’ll be interviewing her live on stage in London for Word Factory. More info below…

anne enrighgt

WORD FACTORY PRESENTS:

SPECIAL EVENT – An Evening with Anne Enright

On the eve of St Patrick’s Day, meet one of the most celebrated literary figures of our age. Man Booker prize winner Anne Enright is the Laureate for Irish Fiction, an acclaimed novelist, short story writer and essayist. Her books include The Wig My Father Wore, The Gathering and The Portable Virgin. In this one-off London event, reading new work commissioned by Word Factory for the Change Maker series, Anne will explore the boundaries of short fiction in new work and her writing life, in conversation with Word Factory associate director Paul McVeigh. Paul, who lives in Belfast, is author of the acclaimed The Good Son, set in the Northern Ireland of the 1970’s.

DON’T MISS THIS MEMORABLE EVENING.

Salon limited to 80 places.

Date and Time

Fri 16 March 2018

19:00 – 20:30 GMT

Add to Calendar

Location

Waterstones

203-206 Piccadilly

London

W1J 9HD

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Join Me in Athens for Flash Fiction Course

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Athens – Flash Fiction with Paul McVeigh  4–8 June 2018

  • Designed for aspiring and accomplished writers alike who want to enhance their skills for writing flash fiction and short fiction
  • Participants will explore and discuss flash fiction and micro literature from a variety of authors and consider their sources of inspiration, and will also have the opportunity to experiment with voice and style
  • Workshops will centre on exercises, constructive feedback, experimentation and discussion in a supportive and friendly atmosphere

In partnership with the Kingston Writing School and Kingston University & The British Council is pleased to announce the courses that comprise our sixth annual International Creative Writing Summer School in Athens and Thessaloniki.

international-creative-writing-summer-school-passionate-about-writing

The Summer School provides opportunities for writers from across the world to develop their critical and analytical skills, enhance their writing abilities, and work intensely in an inspiring and creative workshop environment with experienced writers associated with the Kingston Writing School, Kingston University, London. Among the writers and professors who have taught at the Summer School in the past are: Ed Docx, Ahren Warner, Ann Fischer Wirth, Norma Clarke, Rachel Cusk, Adam Baron, Aimee Parkinson, KJ Orr and Maurice Walsh.

This year, the Summer School offers students the opportunity to enhance their writing skills through writing fiction, flash fiction and/or poetry, and to extend their knowledge of publishing, editing and writing for the web under the supervision and guidance of highly accomplished writers and academics.

Students can choose from seven one-week courses in Athens and a one-week course in Thessaloniki. Workshops in each course will be scheduled from Monday to Friday between 18.30 and 21.00, with extra-curricular activities such as readings and tutorials taking place throughout the week.

Courses will be held in English and are suitable for writers at all levels. See here for dates and course details.

Judging The Edge Hill Short Story Prize

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The Edge Hill Short Story Prize

The Edge Hill Prize (First Prize: £10,000) is awarded annually by Edge Hill University for excellence in a published single author short story collection. The Prize remains unique as the only annually presented award that recognises excellence in a published, single-authored collection of short stories in the UK and Ireland.

I’m delighted to one of the judges of The Edge Hill Short Story Prize 2018. Perhaps you are eligible to enter? Please go over to their site and see.

Edge Hill

The other judges:

Professor Ailsa Cox – The world’s first and only Professor of Short Fiction and expert of Nobel Prize winning short story writer, Alice Munroe

Daisy Johnson – Winner of the 2017 Prize for Short Story

Alice O’Keffe – Critic for The Guardian, The Observer, The New Statesman, and Literary Programmer for the Brighton Festival.

I’m honoured to be judging both this and the Dylan Thomas Prize this year.

I’m in ‘Common People: An Anthology of Working Class Writers’

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Common People: An Anthology of Working Class Writers (edited by Kit de Waal) 

Delighted to be part of this. Please pledge to Unbound.

Want to help unpublished working class writers get into print? Join Kit de Waal and her contributors to give new writers a platform…

In a recent documentary, novelist Kit de Waal asked ‘where are the working class writers?’ The answer is right here.
Inspired by a shared concern that working class voices are increasingly absent from the pages of books and newspapers, Kit de Waal has come together with Unbound and the regional writing development organisations, including New Writing North and Writing West Midlands, to do something about it.
Common People will be a collection of essays, poems and pieces of personal memoir, bringing together sixteen well-known writers from working class backgrounds with an equal number of brand new as-yet-unpublished writers from all over the UK.
These new writers will be selected by the regional writing development agencies, who will support and mentor them in the run-up to publication.
Too often, working class writers find that the hurdles they have to leap are higher and harder to cross than for writers from more affluent backgrounds. Common People will see writers who have made that leap reach back to give a helping hand to those coming up behind.

We read because we want to experience lives and emotions beyond our own, to learn, to see with others’ eyes – without new working class voices, without the vital reflection of real lives, or role models for working class readers and writers, literature will be poorer. We will all be poorer. Pledge for Common People and join these writers to help to make a difference.

Contributors Include:
Damian Barr
Malorie Blackman OBE
Lisa Blower
Jill Dawson
Louise Doughty
Stuart Maconie
Chris McCrudden
Lisa McInerney
Paul McVeigh
Daljit Nagra
Dr Dave O’Brien
Cathy Rentzenbrink
Anita Sethi
Adelle Stripe
Tony Walsh
Alex Wheatle