Sadbh: This week's appointment of a Scottish poet laureate prompts the question: should Ireland have one too?
At a moving ceremony in the Glasgow nursing home where he is being cared for, Scots poet Edwin Morgan, who has cancer, was conferred with the title The Scots Makar, that being a 15th-century term for a maker in the literary sense.
Though the post of British Poet Laureate, currently held by Andrew Motion, is intended to represent the entire UK, many feel it's mainly an English office. "It has never been held by any Welsh, Irish or Scottish poet, so this is a good thing," said Morgan, on his appointment. That's not for want of names being proffered for the British laureate job - most notably, some years back, that of Séamus Heaney. But Heaney had ruled himself out with his immortal lines: "Be advised, my passport's green/No glass of ours was ever raised/ To toast the Queen," and his objections to being included in an anthology of contemporary British poetry edited by Andrew Motion and Blake Morrison. One could say that since winning the Nobel Prize for Literature, Heaney has been Ireland's most public poet and he has written on major events, such as the Belfast Agreement, but the prospect of having an official laureate, now that the Welsh have announced that they will shortly appoint one too, raises exciting questions.
Britain has had one since John Dryden was appointed in 1668; the queen and the prime minister decide who it's to be and, although an unpaid, post, 110 gallons of sherry go to the lucky scribe. Were we to have such a post, who would make the appointment - the President? The Taoiseach? A committee of literati? More importantly, what would the proffered tipple be - Guinness, one presumes? While the British poet laureate writes poems about events in the life of the monarchy, what would an Irish one commemorate - a taoiseach's daughter's wedding? One thing's for sure: there's no shortage of inspired candidates.
Flying break
One never likes to see a literary periodical depart from the scene and that's not happening to The Stinging Fly, but the magazine is going to take a break. Editor and publisher Declan Meade writes in the current issue that the magazine did not make an application for Arts Council funding this year. There will be one more issue, in June, to follow the current one, and then Meade will take a sabbatical.
"Literary magazines come and - sometimes just as quickly - go. They are known to be labours of love, relying on the energy and commitment of one or two individuals. They are usually underfunded and overstretched. The labour doesn't lessen; the love is often tested," says Meade. The magazine is six years in existence and it's to be hoped the hiatus in production only results in an invigorated return to the fray. The current issue has an interview with poet Ian Duhig and work by Máiríde Woods, Rita Ann Higgins, Philip MacCann, Léan Ní Chuilleanáin and Gerard Hanberry, among many others.
• The Stinging Fly, Dublin's Literary Magazine. Issue 17, 6.
Prize poets perform
There will be a parade of prize winners at this year's PN04, the ninth annual Poetry Now Festival run by the Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council Arts Office, which takes place next month. The line-up includes Pulitzer Prize winner, W.S. Merwin; Nobel prize winner, Derek Walcott (left); this year's Forward Poetry Prize winner, Ciaran Carson; and Scottish poet Don Paterson, this year's Whitbread Poetry Award and T.S. Eliot Award winner. As always, young poets will be included and the keynote address will be given by Tom Paulin.
• PN04 takes place on the weekend of March 25th-28th. Bookings 01-2312929; e-mail: arts@dlrcoco.ie www.dlrcoco.ie/arts
Creating facts
Creative non-fiction is a genre that's gathering ground. It marries the techniques of fiction with writing about reality, and one of its champions is Lee Gutkind, who will talk about the phenomenon at the Irish Writers' Centre in Dublin tomorrow. He will also announce details of an international creative non-fiction competition which could be of interest to writers in a range of genres, from travel and memoir to history and polemic.
Details from 01-8532356.