Let Go in Listowel, Let's Go to Hinterland
- Jun 15
- 3 min read
We're so lucky in Ireland to be spoilt for choice in terms of festivals at this time of the year. We can attend music festivals, literary festivals, festivals of ideas and a mix of all of the aforementioned.
One of my all-time favourites is Listowel Writers' Week and I was lucky enough to attend the 55th staging of it at the end of May. My late father was from Listowel so the fact that I meet up with lots of my lovely cousins when I'm there is a wonderful added bonus for me. The Chairperson of the festival committee, Ned O'Sullivan, wrote in his welcome address: 'What started out as a celebration of the North Kerry writing tradition has grown into the multi-faceted literary festival of today.' And multi-faceted it certainly was.
I was very happy to spend my days attending historic walks, contemporary talks, a book launch, music and story-time events, a Ciorcal Cainte, an art exhibition, a one-man dramatic performance and an open mic poetry event. One of the more unusual readings/talks I went to was by the Japanese author Daisuke Yosumi talking about his book 'Let Go.' He told us he is a good friend of Marie Kondo, the minimalist and decluttering guru who espouses the theory that 'Letting go is not a loss – it is an act of self-respect.' Daisuke shared practical lessons from his own life when he chose to let go of a career, of a relationship, of possessions in order to simplify his life and to focus on what mattered for him. However, it did strike me when he told us that he 'chose' to become a father at the age of 51, that us females could make no such choices so late in life.
It was great to experience Listowel Writers' Week back to its former buzzy self, havng been in the doldrums for a few years, in my humble opinion. My one gripe is that in years gone by I used to be able to buy a weekend pass which allowed me to attend any and all events that took my fancy and I was often introduced to new authors in this way. For example, I had never heard of the American writer David Sedaris before I came across him in Listowel in 2011 and I have hugely enjoyed his writing since then. Now that I have to buy an individual ticket for each event, I am much more choosy about what I attend and, at €20, I thought some of them were quite expensive and could add up to quite a costly few days.
Having said that, the fact that Listowel Races takes place towards the end of the festival is an act of genius and it allows those of us who love the spectacle of horse racing and the excitement of a (small!) flutter to indulge that passion also. I'm already looking forward to next year as 'I'd rather be in 'Mike the Pies.'
If you have no clue what I am referring to, let me explain .... On 21st of August 2016, Joe Stack from RTE Sport (who just happens to be the doppelganger of my sister-in-law's huband Brian!) posed with a sign at the Olympics in Rio, that read 'I'd Rather Be in Mike the Pies.' It started a trend among the pub's customers, who have and continue to post photos to social media from all over the world with signs and the hashtag – #idratherbeinmikethepies. To be fair, it is indeed a great pub and music venue.
So, onwards we go to the next literary festival, namely Hinterland. The Hinterland festival originated back in 2013 as the Hay/Kells Festival, in collaboration with the Hay Literary Festival in Wales. Since 2017 it metamorphosed into Hinterland. The exciting news is that I will be performing at an event in McEntee's Funeral Parlour, (the dead centre of town!), at 6.30pm on Sunday the 28th of June next as part of the Lit Crawl set of events. I am so looking forward to reading from my new collection of novella and stories, Love, Lycra and Tattoos and hosting a Q&A and book-signing session afterwards from readers. I look forward to, hopefully, meeting some readers of my blog there. If you are attending, please make yourself known to me as I would really welcome some feedback.
Best of luck on Sunday 28th of June Kathryn 👍
X Nuala