Colm Tóibín is Ireland's Laureate for Irish Fiction and Long Island is the sequel to his prize-winning, bestselling novel Brooklyn. This exquisite, exhilarating novel asks whether it is possible to truly return to the past and renew the great love that seemed gone forever. This podcast was recorded at West Cork Literary Festival on 19 July 2024 and Colm was in conversation with Sinéad Gleeson.

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Colm Tóibín was born in Ireland in 1955. He is the author of eleven novels, including, The Master, Brooklyn and The Magician, and two collections of stories. He has been shortlisted three times for the Booker Prize. In 2021, he was awarded the David Cohen Prize for Literature. Colm was appointed the Laureate for Irish Fiction 2022-2024. His new novel Long Island is published by Picador in May 2024.

Mark your calendars and join us in West Cork from 11-18 July 2025. Our 2025 line-up will be released in late March/early April and you can sign up for our newsletter to hear about it first.

Support West Cork Literary Festival

Become a Friend of West Cork Literary Festival to enjoy priority booking for our highly sought-after festival tickets. In particular, you will be supporting our free events for children and our outreach programmes to allow the festival to be accessible to everyone.

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Listen back to an unforgettable evening of stories, laughter and outspoken opinions with Miriam Margolyes. This podcast was recorded at West Cork Literary Festival on 15 July 2024 and Miriam was in conversation with Lynn Ruane.

‘My new book is called OH MIRIAM! – something that has been said to me a lot over the years, often in tones of strong disapproval. It contains lots more revelations and stories and discoveries and I can't wait to share it with you all!’ Miriam Margolyes

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Born in Oxford, England in 1941 & educated at Newham College, Cambridge, Miriam Margolyes is an award-winning veteran of the stage and screen, and an internationally acclaimed voice-artist. Winner of the BAFTA Best Supporting Actress award for The Age of Innocence, she received an OBE in 2002 for Services to Drama. Her latest book Oh Miriam!: Stories from an Extraordinary Life was published by John Murray Press in September 2023.

Mark your calendars and join us in West Cork from 11-18 July 2025. Our 2025 line-up will be released in late March/early April and you can sign up for our newsletter to hear about it first.

Support West Cork Literary Festival

Become a Friend of West Cork Literary Festival to enjoy priority booking for our highly sought-after festival tickets. In particular, you will be supporting our free events for children and our outreach programmes to allow the festival to be accessible to everyone.

Visit our festival bookshop Bantry Bookshop

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Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The novels of Hisham Matar and Priscilla Morris speak to us now more than ever. ‘My Friends’, the new novel by Booker-shortlisted, Pulitzer prize-winning author Hisham Matar, is a masterful, intensely moving novel about three friends living in political exile and the emotional homeland that deep friendships can provide from the of ‘The Return’. Priscilla Morris’ Women’s Prize-shortlisted novel ‘Black Butterflies’ is set in Sarajevo in the spring of 1992, where each night, nationalist gangs erect barricades, splitting the diverse city into ethnic enclaves and each morning, the residents — whether Muslim, Croat or Serb - push the makeshift barriers aside. This podcast was recorded at West Cork Literary Festival on 16 July 2024 and Hisham and Priscilla were in conversation with Maeve Higgins.

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Hisham Matar was born in New York to Libyan parents, spent his childhood in Tripoli and Cairo and has lived most of his life in London. His memoir The Return was the recipient of the 2017 Pulitzer Prize, the PEN/Jean Stein Award, the Rathbones Folio Prize, the Slightly Foxed Best First Biography Prize, Frances Prix du Livre Etranger Inter & Le Journal du Dimanche and Germany’s Geschwister Scholl Prize. Hisham is a Professor at Barnard College, Columbia University. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Arts. His latest novel My Friends was published by Viking in January 2024.

Priscilla Morris is a British author of Bosnian-Cornish parentage. She grew up in London, spending summers in Sarajevo, and studied at Cambridge University and the University of East Anglia, where she gained her PhD in Creative Writing. She teaches creative writing, most recently at UCD, and divides her time between Ireland and Spain. Her Sarajevo-set debut novel Black Butterflies was short-listed for the Women’s Prize 2023 and several other notable awards.

Mark your calendars and join us in West Cork from 11-18 July 2025. Our 2025 line-up will be released in late March/early April and you can sign up for our newsletter to hear about it first.

Support West Cork Literary Festival

Become a Friend of West Cork Literary Festival to enjoy priority booking for our highly sought-after festival tickets. In particular, you will be supporting our free events for children and our outreach programmes to allow the festival to be accessible to everyone.

Visit our festival bookshop Bantry Bookshop

Follow us on BlueSky Social

Instagram

Twitter/X

Facebook

Subscribe to our YouTube channel

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.