Poetry Ireland announces three new guest editors for Poetry Ireland Review 2024
Poetry Ireland is delighted to announce three new guest editors of Poetry Ireland Review for the 2024 publication year, who will each take up editorship of an upcoming issue of the highly-regarded poetry journal. The three guest editors are Mary O’Donnell, spring issue, Mícheál McCann, summer issue, and Jessica Traynor, winter issue.
This is the third year in which Poetry Ireland has welcomed guest editors for Poetry Ireland Review. All three editors will review submissions for their respective issues of Poetry Ireland Review,142, 143 and 144, over the coming year.
Mary O’Donnell said of the announcement, “I am excited to welcome as diverse a range of poetry as possible from poets on the whole island of Ireland, and internationally. I am interested in the idea of poets 'making space', whether they interpret this as social space, space for difference, or creating space within a private self that offers no popular agenda. Meditative writing is also welcome. Poets borrow from experience all the time and I see this as an opportunity for them to offer the combings of such experience. The language of experience and feeling, however they present it, is unique to them.”
Mícheál McCann said, “I want to dedicate space in Poetry Ireland Review to think seriously about criticism; critical culture; how we review and receive new, old and re-claimed work; and what it means to be ‘received’ as an Irish poet outside of Ireland. I also look forward, with real gratitude, to receiving new poems and reviews from Ireland and beyond.”
Jessica Traynor said, “For the winter 2024 I'd like to ask our writers to think about coldness and coolness in all its forms; whether it's the permafrost that coats a northern landscape, an attitude, or an emotional absence. Are we living in an era of rising temperatures and increasing coldness towards one another as a species? In the face of that coldness, what do we do to keep warm? I'll be seeking contributions on climate, landscape, loss and empathy in poetic and in essay form.”
Previous editors of Poetry Ireland Review have included Annemarie Ní Churreáin, Maurice Riordan, Colette Bryce, Vona Groarke, John F Deane, Caitríona O Reilly, Paul Muldoon, Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin, Aifric Mac Aodha and Nessa O’Mahony.
Poetry Ireland Review 142, 143 and 144 will be published in spring, summer and winter respectively. Current and back issues of Poetry Ireland Review are available to purchase through the Poetry Ireland website.
Guest Editor Biographies
Mary O’Donnell is a poet, short-story writer, and novelist. She has published eight collections of poetry, including Unlegendary Heroes, Those April Fevers, and most recently Massacre of the Birds. Novels include The Light-Makers, The Elysium Testament, and Where They Lie.
She co-edited (with Manuela Palacios) the anthology of Galician Women’s poetry, To the Winds Our Sails. A collection of essays on O’Donnell’s work appeared during 2018: Giving Shape to the Moment: the Art of Mary O’Donnell, Poet, Novelist, Short-story Writer (Peter Lang), edited by Prof Elena Jaime de Pablos, with contributions from Spanish and Irish academics and writers. Since 2001, she has been a member of Ireland’s affiliation of artists, Aosdána.
Mícheál McCann is a poet from Derry. His poems have appeared in The Poetry Review, Banshee, Poetry Ireland Review and Romance Options: Love Poetry for Today. His first collection of poems, Devotion, is forthcoming with The Gallery Press in 2024.
Jessica Traynor is a poet, dramaturg, librettist and creative writing teacher. Her debut collection, Liffey Swim (Dedalus Press, 2014), was shortlisted for the Strong / Shine Award. Her second collection, The Quick, was a 2019 Irish Times poetry choice. She has worked as Literary Manager of the Abbey Theatre and Deputy Museum Director of EPIC The Irish Emigration Museum. She is Poet in Residence at the Yeats Society, Sligo and a Creative Fellow of UCD. She is Poetry Editor for Banshee Press.
For further information please contact media@poetryireland.ie
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