poetry slam

Thoor Closing Night 2017

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Thoor Ballylee Closing Night 2017

New writers write back to Yeats

Come and join the excitement as Sarah Clancy, Lisa McInerny, and our Thoor ‘write back to Yeats’ competition winners perform.  Mingle with our indomitable songsters and new warblers.
Saturday 7th October 2017
€10 – & refreshments
This is Thoor Ballylee’s season closing event of 2017. Don’t miss out!

Thoor Ballylee extended an open invitation to new (or old) poets for a poem in response to Yeats’s lines a hundred years ago (1938) in his poem ‘Under Ben Bulben’ (edited a little, from Stanza V):

Irish poets, learn your trade
Sing the peasantry and then
Hard-riding country gentlemen…
Sing the lords and ladies gay
That were beaten into the clay
Through seven heroic centuries;
Cast your mind on other days
That we in coming days may be
Still the indomitable Irishry
 W.B. Yeats, from ‘Under Ben Bulben’ (1938)
There will be a modest award for the poem which, in the opinion of the audience, best responds to Yeats’s poem.

Closing Night Saturday 7th October 2017 also features:

Sarah Clancy, author of The Truth and Other Stories. This is Sarah’s third collection of poetry. In it she excavates the personal and psychological wreckage caused by an unrelenting recession in her native Ireland and further afield – with sacrificing the warmth, wit, or linguistic extremity for which she is known.
Lisa McInerney’s first novel The Glorious Heresies won the 2016 Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction and the 2016 Desmond Elliott Prize. Her second novel, The Blood Miracles, was published in April 2017 and she is just finishing her third.  She lives in Gort.

Thoor Poetry Competition

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Thoor Ballylee Poetry Competition

 Write back to Yeats!

Thoor Ballylee extends an open invitation to new (or old) poets for a poem in response to Yeats’s lines a hundred years ago (1938) in his poem ‘Under Ben Bulben’ (edited a little, from Stanza V):

Irish poets, learn your trade
Sing the peasantry and then
Hard-riding country gentlemen…
Sing the lords and ladies gay
That were beaten into the clay
Through seven heroic centuries;
Cast your mind on other days
That we in coming days may be
Still the indomitable Irishry
 W.B. Yeats, from ‘Under Ben Bulben’ (1938)
So. Are we still the indomitable Irishry??
One poem only per poet — no pseudonyms.
Add name and address/email/phone to  submitted poem.
Poems should  be under three minutes to say and must reach Galway Bay FM  (arts@galwaybayfm.ie) by Friday 29th September.
Up to three poets may be chosen.
The chosen poet or poets  must be available to come and say or read the poem 7.30 on Saturday October 7th in Thoor Ballylee!
There will be a modest award for the poem which, in the opinion of the audience, best responds to Yeats’s poem.

Poetry Night Saturday 7th October 2017 also features:

Sarah Clancy, author of The Truth and Other Stories. This is Sarah’s third collection of poetry. In it she excavates the personal and psychological wreckage caused by an unrelenting recession in her native Ireland and further afield – with sacrificing the warmth, wit, or linguistic extremity for which she is known.
Lisa McInerney’s first novel The Glorious Heresies won the 2016 Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction and the 2016 Desmond Elliott Prize. Her second novel, The Blood Miracles, was published in April 2017 and she is just finishing her third.  She lives in Gort.

Thoor Ballylee on The Poetry Programe

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Following the successful poetry slam held at Thoor Ballylee late last year, Thoor Ballylee and its living poets are celebrated on RTÉ’s The Poetry Programme.

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The programme samples the lively atmosphere of the inaugural Thoor Ballylee Poetry Slam and hears from organisers Lelia Doolan and Sarah Clancy. Paul McNamara, winner of the competition, is second from left.

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‘Leabhar na hAthghabhála / Poems of Repossession’ is an impressive anthology of poetry in Irish from the past century with English translations. Editor, poet, and translator Louis de Paor chooses some poems from the anthology and talks about his desire to make this work visible to a wider audience.

Martina Evans is sure we all have a poem in us. She talks with Rick O’Shea and reads from her collection ‘The Windows of Graceland,’ published by Carcanet.

To listen to the programme, broadcast on RTÉ Radio One 7.30pm Saturday 7th January, follow this link.

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Thoor Ballylee heads calls for flood relief

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As Thoor Ballylee closes for the winter, representatives repeat calls for state intervention on flood relief for South Galway.

The Yeats Thoor Ballylee Society, a community group in south Galway which runs W.B. Yeats’s former retreat at Thoor Ballylee, has appealed for State support for the area as it anticipates fresh flooding this winter, the Irish Times has reported.

Speaking before a fundraising poetry slam event at the tower this weekend, curator Rena McAllen said flooding at the tower last winter did not recede until March.

Ms McAllen is part of a community group that acquired a lease for Thoor Ballylee – a 15th century Hiberno-Norman tower house with what Yeats described as a “winding, gyring spiring treadmill of a stair”– after it was closed by Fáilte Ireland due to flooding in 2009.

During Yeats’ tenure, the Streamstown river would food the building’s ground floor, but the flooding is now more frequent and much higher.

See more in the Irish Times report here.

The Yeats Thoor Ballylee Society is pleased to report that there is no immediate risk of of flooding to the tower and cottages. However the water table in the area is very high, and if rain comes then further flooding is in prospect again this winter.

Thankfully work has been completed on preparing the tower and cottages for the winter. This means that at ground level it has been entirely clear of its exhibitions and all movable goods. Permanent electricity and heating systems were moved above flood height earlier this year.

It is good news that all is dry at present.

Still, with flooding increasing year on year, better solutions might be found to relieve the annual uncertainty and the very real cost to livelihoods in the area.

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Thoor Ballylee October 2016

Poetry Slam at Thoor Ballylee

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Poetry Slam Competition

Thoor Ballylee

Saturday 15 October 2016

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A slam poetry competition will take place in Thoor Ballylee, the former home of WB Yeats on Saturday October 15. Performance poets are  invited to apply for one of 10 places at the event. This is the first competition of its kind to be held at the tower house.

This event will be MC-ed by Galway poets and former Cuirt Grand Slam winners Elaine Feeney and Sarah Clancy who, jealous of the attention being given to the other poets, may decide to perform some of their own poems in the interval.

Prizes are available, for those who like fumbling in the greasy till, including a first prize €250, second prize of €100, and third prize of €50, sponsored by Poetry Ireland.

All poets who perform and all judges will also receive a copy of Poetry Ireland Review Issue 116: A WB Yeats Special Issue, also sponsored by Poetry Ireland.

There will be 10 slots for poets to perform at this event, with the contestants selected in advance by Elaine Feeney and Sarah Clancy based on submissions. Entries for this event are open now and poets wishing to enter must send a poem of their own in any format — text, video, or recording — to sarahclancygalway@gmail.com on or before October 4.  All submissions must include ‘Tower Poetry Slam Entry’ in the title of the e-mail.

Each poem must be three minutes’ duration or less. There will be two rounds, with the five highest scoring poets from round one going through to the second round, after which the winners will be decided. Qualifying poets must perform a different poem in the second round. In each round the judges will be selected from the audience and their decisions will be both subjective and final.

Poets are expected to perform their poems without using a script and scoring will reflect this. Poems must be the performer’s own work and not have been previously published in book form nor have been the winning poem in any other slam competition.

Transport from Galway will be available by bus which will depart from the Spanish Arch (in front of Jury’s Hotel ) at 6.30pm and will return to there after the event. Tickets for bus and admission are €20, €10 for admission only, and there will be no admission charge for performing poets.

Refreshments, including wine, will be available for purchase on the night.

To book tickets call Thoor Ballylee between 10am and 2pm daily on 091 631436. Or email yeatsthoorballylee@gmail.com. There will also be limited admission on the door.

Any funds raised will go towards supporting the Yeats Thoor Ballylee Society in its work preserving Thoor Ballylee.

Hear W.B. Yeats read his own verse here! As he says, he reads with great emphasis upon the rhythm.

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