Adult Competitions Shortlists and Literary Lunch

Shortlists and winning entries for the 2024 Allingham Poetry and Flash Fiction Competitions have been selected by judges Kate Newmann and Nuala O’Connor. Winners have already been informed and they will read their work at the Awards Ceremony on Saturday 9 November. Shortlistees and winners include:

POETRY

Bless Me Father For I Have Swimmed – Frankie McPhillips

Blood Pear - Heritage Variety – Elaine Desmond

Bog Uncles – Gerry O’Donnell

Granduncle – Peggy McCarthy

Holy – A M Cousins

Kim – Frank Farrelly

Little Big Man – Brian Kirk

My mother: laughing – Stella Harvey Birrell

Never Mourned – Liam Boyle

Tall Boys – Deidre (Deig) Sullivan

The Goldfinch – Mary Melvin Geoghogan

The Lime Tree – Padraig McLoughlin

The More of Less – Deirdre Hines

This and That – Eugene O’Hare

FLASH FICTION

Big Top – Rachel Smart

Jonah – Seamus Harrington

Saltwater – Anne Byrne

Such Consolations We Find – Jennifer McMahon

Sunk – Ciaran Cunningham

Terms and Conditions – Jamie D Stacey

The Questions – Partridge Boswell

Unstable – Fiona McKay

White Horses – Ruth Mary O’Shea

Your Heart’s Right There – Jo Nestor

The Awards Ceremony will take place at the Literary Lunch in the Nirvana Restaurant, Ballyshannon on Saturday, 9 Nov. Admission is free; an optional buffet lunch is available at €20 per ticket.

Noon – Ongoing: Buffet Lunch

12:30 – 1:30: Awards Ceremony

1:30 – 2:00 Book Launch: Pool of Darkenss – Raymond Chandler in Ireland by Tom Sigafoos

And the Schools Winners ARe...

Don't forget to join Patricia Keane on our YouTube Channel tomorrow at 2.30 for the announcement of the results of the Post-Primary Schools competitions. They will also appear here shortly afterwards.

Away with the Fairies - An Audience with William and Helen

Allingham Festival audiences of the last few years have regularly enjoyed interviews conducted by Sinead Crowley, including such highlights as Liz Nugent and Claire Keegan. We are delighted that Sinead has kindly agreed to host a number of events again this year. One of these will be a little different to anything she experienced in her former life as Media Correspondent of RTE.

It seems that somehow William and Helen Allingham will contrive to return to Ballyshannon for one night only to mark this very special Bicentenary Festival. They will talk to Sinead about William’s early days in Ballyshannon and his love of music, Helen’s significant achievements as a watercolourist and the many famous people they mixed with from Thomas Carlyle to Charles Dickens, Hans Christian Andersen and the Pre-Raphaelite brotherhood. Alfred Lord Tennyson is expected to make a surprise contribution. They may even be persuaded to say a word or two about how Ballyshannon has changed since they were last here.

Most of what will be said will be their own words from diaries, letters and other writings. However, some license will be taken to fit the staged entertainment so strict historical accuracy is not guaranteed.

The chat show format will be enhanced with a slideshow (or Magic Lantern in their words). It may be that in some Allingham festival of the distant future a similar event will be organised using artificial intelligence and avatars in the style of those used for ABBA in a current London production. For now, William and Helen will be channeled by local actors Michael McMullin and Patricia Keane. Renowned musician, Martin McGinley will illustrate William's love of Iriah music and, in a late addition to the cast, Holly McEneaney will appear as Eva Allingham.

The event will take place in Theatre 1 in the Abbey Arts Centre on Saturday, November 9 at 6 PM, Adm €10. It will be finished in plenty of time for those lucky individuals going on to the Muireann Bradley concert in St Anne’s at 8.

A joint production with Ballyshannon Drama Society.

AllingDram

We are delighted to be working with three emerging writers with strong Donegal connections, Shaun Byrne, Kieran Kelly and Gerry Moriarty.
They have each supplied us with a 20-30 minute excerpt from works they have in progress. These will be given a Workshop Production by actors from the Ballyshannon Drama Society. More than a rehearsed reading but short of a full production, this will give a rare chance to see such talented writers display their creations in embryonic stage.

Homegirls by Shaun Byrne, is a historical piece set in St. Joseph’s, Stranorlar in 1932. The cast will present a number of short vignettes from different parts of the play, giving a sense of the whole. Performers include Louise Larkin, Anne-Marie Garvey, Roisin Lee, Diarmuid McInerney and Sean McLoone. It’s directed by Sean McLoone.

The Evicted by Kieran Kelly is based on a true story. Set in Donegal in 1865 with the Derryveagh Evictions as the background. The story is a personal one for Kieran as his ancestors were among the families evicted in 1861. The opening scene of the play will be performed by Ronan Drummond, Callum Gallagher and Joanne Cassidy. The director is Terence McEneaney.

The Priests is Gerry Moriarty’s first play. An Irish priest has retired from a career on the African Missions in Africa to an English parish..A journalist threatens to publicly expose an allegation against him. In this scene from the middle of the play he discusses his situation with a friend from school days who is now his housekeeper. Parts will be played by Mary Hoey and Mark Kirby with Kevin Lilly directing, assisted by Audrey Davitt.

The performances will be followed by a short Q & A with the writers, led by Michael McMullin.

Sunday, November 10, 3:30 in Theatre 1 in the Abbey Arts Centre. Adm €10.

Download a Free Programme for this innovative and exciting event.

A joint production with Ballyshannon Drama Society.

Newsflash.

In a late but very welcome addition to the Allingham programme we are delighted to announce that an Allingham Bicentenary Exhibition will be on display in the newly reopened Ballyshannon library from Wednesday, 6 November during normal library opening hours. With the kind assistance of library staff there will be an extensive collection of books by and about William and Helen Allingham on display.

Allied Irish Banks have kindly loaned their fine bronze bust of the poet which was commissioned by them in 1971 from the noted sculptor, Arthur Breen, to mark the centenary of County Donegal Historical Association.

Also on view will be an image of a plaster bust of William Allingham created by his friend, the Scottish sculptor Alexander Munro in 1855. Following a successful display in the Royal Academy exhibition of that year, two copies of this piece were delivered to William Allingham’s home on The Mall, Ballyshannon. In 1908 Mrs Faucett donated this copy to the National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin. In the same year, Helen Allingham donated her watercolour portrait of William to the same institution.

Another feature of the exhibition will be a set of reproductions of Helen’s breakthrough project when she provided 12 illustrations for the first edition of Thomas Hardy’s Far from the Madding Crowd. These drew the admiring attention of no less a figure than Vincent van Gogh.

Free Internet access will be available to allow visitors to browse the extensive collection of letters by and to the Allinghams held in the University of Illinois.

Many snippets from contemporary newspapers concerning this remarkable couple and their contacts with some of the most noted writers and artists of the time will also be on view.

The exhibition will be formally opened by Mr Anthony Begley, Ballyshannon’s greatest authority on the Allingham family at 11 AM on Friday, November 8. Admission free, all welcome.

The exhibition is expected to continue for some time beyond this year’s festival during normal library opening hours:

Wednesday 9:30 a.m.–1 p.m., 2–5:30 p.m.

Friday 9:30 a.m.–1 p.m., 2–5:30 p.m.