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Welcome to the Munster
Literature Centre
Founded in 1993, the Munster Literature Centre (Ionad Litríochta an Deiscirt) is a non-profit arts organisation dedicated to the promotion and celebration of literature, especially that of Munster. To this end, we organise festivals, workshops, readings and competitions. Our publishing section, Southword Editions, publishes a biannual journal, poetry collections and short stories. We actively seek to support new and emerging writers and are assisted in our efforts through funding from Cork City Council, Cork County Council and the Arts Council of Ireland.Originally located in Sullivan's Quay, the centre moved to its current premises in the Frank O'Connor House (the author's birthplace) at 84 Douglas Street, in 2003.
In 2000, the Munster Literature Centre organised the first Frank O'Connor International Short Story Festival, an event dedicated to the celebration of the short story and named for one of Cork's most beloved authors. The festival showcases readings, literary forums and workshops. Following continued growth and additional funding, the Cork City - Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award was introduced in 2005, coinciding with Cork's designation as that year's European Capital of Culture. The award is now recognised as the single biggest prize for a short story collection in the world and is presented at the end of the festival.In 2002, the Munster Literature Centre introduced the Seán Ó Faoláin Short Story Prize, an annual short story competition dedicated to one of Ireland's most accomplished story writers and theorists. This too is presented during the FOC festival. The centre also hosts the Cork Spring Literary Festival each year, at which the Gregory O'Donoghue International Poetry Prize is awarded (established 2010).
Workshops are held by featured authors in both autumn and spring, allowing the general public to receive creative guidance in an intimate setting for a minimal fee. In addition, the centre sponsors a Writer in Residence each year. We invite you to browse our website for further information regarding our events, Munster literature, and other literary information. Should you have any queries, we would be happy to hear from you.
Connect with Munster
Literature Centre
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NEWS ARCHIVE
NOVEMBER - DECEMBER 2015
THE 2016 GREGORY O'DONOGHUE INTERNATIONAL
POETRY COMPETITION

The 2016 competition deadline has passed, and we would like to extend a sincere thank-you to everyone who entered. The longlisted, shortlisted and winning writers will be notified by the end of December. A public announcement will be made via newsletter, social media, and here at our website in the new year.
SEPTEMBER - OCTOBER 2015
Poetry Workshop with Leanne O'Sullivan

6 week course for €120 (100 concs.)
21 October - 25 November 2015
Wednesdays, 7pm - 9pm. Max 12 students.
Lower age limit: 16
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THE 2016 GREGORY O'DONOGHUE INTERNATIONAL
POETRY COMPETITION
(Entries from 1 September to 30 November 2015)
The Munster Literature Centre is a not-for-profit organisation; all moneys raised from the competition benefits writers and writing.
1st Prize €1000, a week's residency at the Tyrone Guthrie Centre, publication in Southword
and a trip to Cork, Ireland*.
2nd Prize €500 & publication in Southword
3rd Prize €250 & publication in Southword
Ten runners-up to be published in Southword and receive €30 publication fee.
The Munster Literature Centre holds an annual competition for an international poetry prize for a single poem, named in honour of a late Irish poet long associated with the Centre. The Gregory O’Donoghue International Poetry Prize will have a first prize of €1,000 (approx $1122.07 USD/ £727.63 GBP @ xe.com on 16th September 2015), a week's residency at the Tyrone Guthrie Centre and publication in Southword Literary Journal. The MLC will subvent travel costs for the winner up to €600 and provide hotel accommodation and meals for three days during the Cork Spring Poetry Festival. There will be a second prize of €500, third prize of €250, and ten runners-up will each have their poems published in Southword and receive Southword’s standard fee of €30.
Click here to visit the competition page for information on guidelines and how to enter.
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THE SEAN O'FAOLAIN SHORT
STORY COMPETITION

The results are in! Congratulations are in order for Evelyn Walsh of Georgia, USA, who took first prize for her story 'White Rabbit'. Second Prize went to Dolores Walshe of Leitrim, Ireland, for her story 'Small Yellow Sun'.
To view the shortlisted and longlisted stories, please visit our competition page!
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CORK INTERNATIONAL SHORT STORY FESTIVAL
(Formerly the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Festival)
  
23 - 26 September 2015
For more information on events, please visit our dedicated websites:
http://www.corkshortstory.net.
http://www.frankoconnor-shortstory-award.net/
2015 readers to include Carys Davies, Claire Keegan, Segun Afolabi, Danielle McLaughlin, Kirsty Gunn and many more.
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Call for Applications--NOW CLOSED.
Poets to avail of mentorship
under the guidance of James Harpur
Deadline 7 September 2015.
The poet James Harpur has been chosen to be the Munster Literature Centre / Words Ireland Poetry Mentor.
James Harpur has had five books of poetry published by Anvil Press, including his latest, Angels and Harvesters (2012), which is a Poetry Book Society Recommendation. The Dark Age (2007) won the 2009 Michael Hartnett Award. Other prizes and bursaries include the 1995 British National Poetry Competition, two Arts Council of Ireland Bursaries, a Society of Authors Bursary, an Eric Gregory Award, and a Hawthornden Fellowship. His poems have been published in national newspapers such as The Irish Times, the Guardian and the Independent and broadcast on national radio, including RTE 1 and BBC Radio 4. He has been included in many anthologies, such as The Forward Book of Poetry (Faber 2001), Staying Alive (Bloodaxe 2008), and The Best of Irish Poetry (Southword Editions 2009).
He has conducted workshops at the Arvon Foundation, Lancaster University, Galway University, and at many other venues and locations in Ireland and the UK. He has also mentored and tutored published and beginner poets. He lives in West Cork, Ireland, and is a member of Aosdána.
More information about him and links to his work can be found at http://www.jamesharpur.com/
We are now calling for applications for the position of Mentored Poet.
Applications are invited from Munster-resident poets (with at least one collection published and no more than two) who would like to be mentored by James Harpur while working towards their next collection. The successful candidate will meet the mentor for six sessions. The first five two-hour sessions will be devoted to assessing batches of poems building towards your next book. The sixth session will be devoted to the overall shape of your manuscript. Mentoring sessions can take place at the Munster Literature Centre or at a location mutually agreeable to the Mentor & Mentee. The first mentoring meeting will be arranged for October 2015. Five further meetings will occur at approximately two-monthly intervals with the last session taking place in September 2016.
Submit a PDF or word document consisting of 10 poems from your manuscript in progress, a literary CV and a note outlining how you believe you could benefit from this opportunity to Patrick Cotter, Artistic Director, The Munster Literature Centre at munsterlit(AT)eircom.net. Deadline: September 7th. All eligible applications will be forwarded to James Harpur who will be the sole selector of the successful candidate. Candidates should not canvass James Harpur directly.
JULY - AUGUST 2015
Congratulations to the winners of the
Fool For Poetry Competition!

Victor Tapner has taken top prize with his manuscript Banquet In the Hall of Happiness. Tapner's full collection Flatlands was published by Salt in 2010. Among his previous honours he has won the Cardiff International Poetry Competition, the Wigtown Prize and Flatlands won the East Anglian Book Award for Poetry.
Tania Hershman came second with her manuscript Nothing Here is Wild, Everything is Open. Tania has published books of short fiction previously but this will be her debut poetry volume. Her fiction books are The White Road & Other Stories (Salt, 2008) and My Mother Was An Upright Piano (Tangent, 2012).
The following poets were also selected as finalists from a field of over 200 entries:
Liz Bahs, Berkshire, UK
Garret Bryant, California,
Catherine Cole, Wollongong, Australia.
Kevin Conroy, Naas, Ireland
Paul McMahon, Sligo, Ireland
Lauren Rusk, California
Ryan Vine, Minnesota
The judging process consisted of Patrick Cotter selecting the finalist manuscripts and past and present Southword Poetry editors, James Harpur, Thomas McCarthy, Leanne O'Sullivan and Matthew Sweeney, ranking (without mutual consultation) each finalist in order of preference. When points were added up Victor Tapner and Tania Hershman came out tops.
The winning chapbooks will be launched at next February's Cork International Poetry Festival.
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Southword Journal Issue 28 now online!

Featuring poems selected by editor Matthew Sweeney, including work by Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin, John McAuliffe, Maurice Riordan, Fiona Pitt-Kethley, the late John Hartley-Williams, and more; six new short stories selected by fiction editor Danielle McLaughlin; litríocht as Gaeilge curated by Colm Breathnach; and reviews of four new English language publications from Irish writers.
Read issue 28 free online.
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APRIL - JUNE 2015
Fool For Poetry International Chapbook Competition
now closed!

Thank you to everyone who entered.
Shortlist announced in July. Winners announced in September. Sign up for email newsletter to receive results directly in your inbox! We regret, due to large numbers of entries, we are unable to contact submitters who do not place in the competition individually.
More information about the competition.
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Fool for Poetry
Chapbooks
Some people are fools for love, others are fools for poetry
 
2014 winners Virginia Astley & Victoria Kennefick
Buy their winning chapbooks at our online bookshop.
JANUARY - MARCH 2015
Cork Spring Poetry Festival
11 -14 February 2015
 
Jo Shapcott, Lavinia Greenlaw, Don Share, David Wheatley, Grace Wells, Martina Evans, and many more will be reading. Additionally, we'll have events focussing on Irish poetry publications including the Poetry Bus, the Penny Dreadful and Southword Journal. This year will also feature multiple book launches, including the 'Fool for Poetry' chapbook competition winners Victoria Kennefick and Virgina Astley.
Visit corkpoetryfest.net for more information.
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THE GREGORY O'DONOGHUE INTERNATIONAL
POETRY COMPETITION
The Munster Literature Centre is a not-for-profit organisation; all moneys raised from the competition benefits writers and writing.
Announcing the 2015 winners
These poems will be published in a future issue of Southword Journal.
1st Prize: 'Self Portrait in the Convex Bulge of a Hare's Eye'

by Breda Wall-Ryan of Co. Wicklow, Ireland
2nd Prize: 'Love Meter'
by Caitlin Pryor of Texas, USA
3rd Prize: 'Radio Clash'
by Jane Satterfield of Maryland, USA
View the shortlisted and highly commended poems here.
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2014 ARCHIVE
2013 ARCHIVE
2012 ARCHIVE
2011 ARCHIVE
2010 ARCHIVE
2009 ARCHIVE
2008 ARCHIVE
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Read all the latest issues
of Southword journal
online here

The Munster Literature Centre
is a constituent member
of Words Ireland.
Seán Ó Faoláin
Short Story
Competition 2018
judge Paul McVeigh

2017 Winner:
Louise Nealon

Read the winning story
View images from the Cork
International Poetry Festival
2018

Preperations are underway
for the 2019
Cork
International Poetry Festival
March 27-30

The 2018 Fool for Poetry
Chapbook
Competition
is now accepting entries.
Deadline 30 June
Find out more.
Southword Editions
Chapbooks
on sale in
our bookstore

including Fool For Poetry
winners, the New Irish
Voices series & more
The Gregory O'Donoghue
International
Poetry Competition

This year's winner is Rob Lipton
whose poem will be published
in the next issue of Southword
The competition will reopen
for submissions
in
September 2018
Frank O'Connor
Short Story Fellowship

2018 Fellow:
Carys Davies

Recent additions:
Michelle O'Sullivan
Paddy Bushe
Doireann Ní Gríofa
Paul Casey
poetryinternationalweb.net
The Cork
International
Short Story Festival

Wednesday Septmeber 12-
Saturday September 15 2018
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