National Library of IrelandJune 8th - 24th 2011

A celebration of William Butler Yeats

Summer’s Wreath

National Library of IrelandKildare Street, Dublin 201 603 0200events@nli.iewww.nli.ie

View the exhibition Yeats: the life and works of William Butler Yeats at the National Library of Ireland, Kildare Street, Dublin 2 or online at www.nli.ie/yeats. Free guided tours on Wednesdays at 1pm.

BonoBruce Arnold Robert Ballagh John Banville Patrick Bergin Terence Brown Marina Carr Lorcan Cranitch Sinéad Cusack Polly Devlin Theo Dorgan Adrian Dunbar Roy Foster Gavin Friday Diarmuid Gavin Bob Geldof Alan Gilsenan Germaine Greer George Hamilton Josephine Hart Mark Hederman Bosco Hogan Anjelica Huston Jeremy Irons Jennifer Johnston Neil Jordan Billy Keane Brian Keenan John Kelly David Kelly Declan Kiberd Cerys Matthews Nell McCafferty Barry McGovern Kevin Myers David Norris Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin Edna O’Brien Mike Scott Fiona Shaw Colm Tóibín John Waters Kathleen Watkins Don Wycherley P

revi

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part

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ants

hav

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clu

ded:

Come away, O human child!To the waters and the wildWith a faery, hand in hand,For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand

Ticket Information

Lunchtime Events Commence at 1pm30 minutes durationAdmission Free

Evening EventsCommence at 8pmMax. duration 60 minutesAdmission €10 per event

One Day Immersion CourseFull DayAdmission €25

To Book: www.nli.ie

William Butler Yeats was born on June 13th 1865 into one of Ireland’s great artistic families. He went on to become a major poet of the 20th century and to exert a profound influence on world literature. He was passionately interested in Ireland, folklore, theatre and politics and was one of the most significant influences on the formation of an Irish cultural identity.

The fifth Summer’s Wreath programme, which will take place in June, will celebrate the creativity and legacy of William Butler Yeats. Many Irish and international guests will grace us with their personal reflections and readings from Yeats’s poetry, plays and stories. We look forward to welcoming you to share in this universal love of Yeats’s creativity.

Be part of our celebration this summer!

Summer’s Wreath

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W.B. Yeats born 13th June 1865

Thursday, June 9th, 2011 at 1pm (Free Admission/No Booking Required/30 minutes duration)

Reading & Reflection with Fergal Keane

Fergal Keane is an Irish writer, broadcaster and presenter of the recent groundbreaking series The Story of Ireland – a five-part series on the history of Ireland. For many years, he worked as the BBC’s Southern Africa Correspondent where his reports covered the township unrest in South Africa, Mandela’s increasing popularity and the first multi-racial elections following the end of apartheid. From this experience he wrote The Bondage of Fear. As Southern Africa correspondent he also covered the civil war in Rwanda and wrote the book Season of Blood about his experiences reporting such a harrowing story. In 1995, Fergal became the BBC’s Asia correspondent, covering all the main stories in the region. He has won numerous awards for his radio and television reports. In 1996 Fergal was awarded an OBE for his services to journalism.

Monday, June 13th, 2011 at 1pm (Free Admission/No Booking Required/30 minutes duration)

Reading & Reflection with Tamasin Day-Lewis

Daughter of Irish poet Cecil Day-Lewis, who was Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom from 1968 – 1972, Tamasin Day-Lewis was one of the first batch of women to be accepted by King’s College Cambridge from where she has an M.A. in English Literature. She has worked as a documentary film-maker for 15 years, directing and producing over two dozen films for the BBC, ITV and Channel 4. As a writer on food, she has written a dozen cookery books, appeared in two television series and gives masterclasses and talks all over the world. Tamasin writes about all subjects related and unrelated to food for publications including Vogue, Vanity Fair, Stella Magazine, the Financial Times, Saveur and Marie Claire. She also wrote the food page for the Daily Telegraph for six years. She lives in Somerset and Co. Mayo and reads poetry almost every day.

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Wednesday, June 15th, 2011 at 1pm (Free Admission/No Booking Required/30 minutes duration)

Reading & Reflection with Hugo Hamilton

Hugo Hamilton was born in Dublin of German and Irish parentage. His acclaimed memoir The Speckled People has been called an ‘instant classic’ and has become an international best-seller which has been translated into 20 languages and won major European prizes including the Prix Femina in France and the Berto Prize in Italy. He is the acclaimed author of two memoirs including The Sailor in the Wardrobe, seven novels and one collection of short stories, all of which reflect on the issues of cultural divisions, belonging and identity. His latest novel Hand in the Fire explores the uneasy trespassing of migrancy in Ireland and is now available in paperback.

Thursday, June 23rd, 2011 at 1pm (Free Admission/No Booking Required/30 minutes duration)

Reading & Reflection with Kate O’Toole

Kate O’Toole is an Irish actress whose film roles have included JohnHuston’s last film, The Dead, Dancing at Lughnasa, The League of Gentlemen’s Apocalypse, Nora and Possession. Among other television appearances, she has played the role of Lady Salisbury in The Tudors and her stage performances have included The Hostage, Pygmalion, Hamlet, Macbeth, Stage Door, Double Cross and Drama at Inish. Kate was awarded the British Arts Council/Barclays Theatre Awards for Best Actress 2001 for Three Tall Women and was nominated for Irish Times/Irish Theatre Awards, Best Actress 2002, for her role in Dead Funny. Daughter of Irish actor Peter O’Toole and actress Siân Phillips, she studied drama at Yale School of Drama and Circle in the Square. She lives in Connemara, Co. Galway.

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She bid me take love easy, as the leaves grow on the tree;But I, being young and foolish, with her would not agree.

Wednesday, June 8th, 2011 at 8pm (Admission €10 To Book: www.nli.ie)

Frank Delaney in conversation

As well as being a best-selling author, Frank Delaney has interviewed more than 3,000 writers for the BBC, international television and radio shows including the great literary names of our time. A judge of many literary prizes including the famous Booker Prize, Delaney has also made documentaries for the BBC on characters as diverse as Joyce, Shaw, and Wilde. Delaney’s lecture subjects have included Joyce, Yeats, Beckett and Robert Frost and the influence of vernacular storytelling on literature.

In 1979, his first book, James Joyce’s Odyssey was published to criticalacclaim and best-seller status. Since then, Delaney has written six books of non-fiction, twelve novels, one novella, two anthologies, and a smattering of short stories published in both magazines and collections. He has edited compilations of essays and poetry, written theatrical plays for the stage, radio plays for broadcast and screenplays for films, a number of which have been produced.

Monday, June 13th, 2011 at 8pm (Admission €10 To Book: www.nli.ie)

Professor Roy Foster & Joseph M. Hassett Yeats Scholars in conversation touching on their recently published books on W.B. Yeats

The distinguished Oxford scholar, Professor Roy Foster was born in Waterford in 1949. He was elected first Carroll Professor of Irish history at the University of Oxford in 1991 and has previously been the Professor of Modern British History at Birbeck College, University of London, as well as holding visiting fellowships at St Antony’s College, Oxford, The Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton and Princeton University. He has been a Fellow of the British Academy since 1989. His biography of W.B. Yeats is generally recognised as the definitive biography of the poet. Published in two volumes - W.B. Yeats, A Life, Vol I: The Apprentice Mage, 1865-1914 (1997) and W.B. Yeats, A Life, Vol II: The Arch Poet, 1915-1939 (2003) - the combined work runs to more than 1400 pages and represents the benchmark for studies on Yeats. His other books include Charles Stewart Parnell: The Man and His Family (1976), Lord Randolph Churchill: A Political Life (1981), Modern Ireland 1600-1972 (1988), The Oxford Illustrated History of Ireland (1989) among others. His book Words Alone: Yeats and his Inheritances was published in April.

Joseph Hassett has lectured widely on Yeats and other Irish writers at venues including the Trieste Joyce School, the Princess Grace Irish Library in Monaco, and Oxford University. His book W.B. Yeats and the Poetics of Hate was published in 1986 and his book W.B. Yeats and the Muses was published last year by Oxford University Press. He holds a law degree from Harvard University and an M.A. and Ph.D, in Anglo-Irish Literature from University College Dublin. Hassett is a Washington-based lawyer with the firm of Hogan Lovells and serves as outside counsel to the Embassy of Ireland in Washington.

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She bid me take love easy, as the leaves grow on the tree;But I, being young and foolish, with her would not agree.

W.B. Yeats born 13th June 1865

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Saturday, June 18th 2011 at 8pm(Admission €10 To Book: www.nli.ie)

Yeats in Words and Music - Reading by Andrea Corr and music by Liam O’Flynn, uilleann pipes

Special Saturday Night Performance National Library of Ireland’s Reading Room

Andrea Corr is an Irish musician, songwriter and actress. For a decadeand a half, she was the lead singer of the Celtic folk rock and pop group The Corrs which reached multi platinum status in several countries and sold over 60 million records. Andrea is now pursuing a solo career and released her second album Lifelines in May 2011. Andrea’s acting career has also blossomed with critically acclaimed stage and screen roles. The Irish Times called her performance of Jane Eyre at the Gate Theatre in Dublin “fierce and earnest”. Andrea appeared at the Old Vic in Brian Friel’s Dancing at Lughnasa, with the Daily Telegraph describing her performance as a “notable stage debut”. She received an honorary MBE for her contribution to music and charity in 2005.

Born in Kildare to a musical family, Liam O’Flynn formed the legendary group Planxty with Donal Lunny, Christy Moore and Andy Irvine. He has recorded and performed with international musicians as diverse as Van Morrison, John Cage and Mark Knopfler. His sound-track recordings include Cal, The Field and A River Runs Through It (with Elmer Bernstein) among others. Liam has performed with orchestras in Ireland, Britain, the USA, Canada and Australia among other countries and has appeared internationally in Shaun Davey’s works most notably The Brendan Voyage. He has made over 50 recordings, including, most recently, Out To Another Side, The Given Note, The Piper’s Call and The Poet and the Piper, a collaboration with Nobel Laureate Seamus Heaney. In 2000 Liam was awarded the Gold Insignia of the University of La Coruña, Spain, for his contribution to the arts. He composed and performed music for the inauguration of President Mary McAleese and has since accompanied the President on a number of state visits.

Thursday, June 23rd, 2011 at 8pm(Admission €10 To Book: www.nli.ie)

Celtic Fever - a lecture by Sir Andrew Motion

Andrew Motion, poet, novelist and biographer, presided as Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom from 1999 to 2009. He has been awarded the Arvon/Observer Prize, the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize and the Dylan Thomas Prize. His latest book Laurels and Donkeys (Clutag Press), is a collection of war poems presenting scenes from various conflicts of the 20th & 21st centuries - from the First World War to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He is Professor of Creative Writing at Royal Holloway and co-founded the Poetry Archive. Andrew Motion was knighted for his services to literature in 2009. His next book is a sequel to Treasure Island.

In this special event, Sir Andrew will look at the influence of Yeats on the poetry of Philip Larkin. He will reflect on the way in which Yeats shaped the young Larkin’s aesthetic in very direct ways, as well as by opening his work to the influence of Continental Symbolist poets. He will also look at how these effects lingered, long after Larkin himself claimed to have cured himself of the ‘Celtic fever’, and embraced the different example of Thomas Hardy instead.

Far-off, most secret, and inviolate Rose,Enfold me in my hour of hours; where thoseWho sought thee in the Holy Sepulchre,Or in the wine-vat, dwell beyond the stirAnd tumult of defeated dreams;

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One Day Immersion Course

THE POETRY OF W.B. YEATS: MEMORIES & PARAGONSFriday, June 24th, 2011 9.30am - 5.30pm with lunch-break Places Limited / Booking Essential / Cost €25

Designed for the interested amateur as well as for lovers of poetry andliterature in general, this year’s immersion course takes a fresh look atYeats’s poetry. Beginning with an overview of Yeats’s biography, followed by an introduction to the reading techniques associated with poetry, this day-long course will discuss thirteen of Yeats’s poems.

The poems to be considered over the course of the day will fall into two categories: those in which Yeats is remembering people – some of whom were very close to him – and those in which he is presenting historical or artistic models which had a corrective or sustaining power for Yeats and his times. Some of the figures recalled by Yeats in the poems to be discussed will include: Maud Gonne; John Millington Synge; Robert Gregory; the 1916 rebels; a number of people historically associated with Thoor Ballylee; Yeats’s own literary characters and even his younger self. The remaining poems to be covered will all feature paragons worthy of emulation, including: the Irish patriots of the 18th century; John O’Leary; Charles Stewart Parnell; Yeats’s ideal audience and a Japanese sword. Participants will be given the opportunity to share their interpretations and opinions and will be encouraged to visit the National Library of Ireland’s Yeats exhibition to see items of specific interest relating to the course.

Course tutor: Dr Gerard Dineen was awarded a Ph.D. by Trinity College Dublin for his thesis on the early fiction of George A. Birmingham. He has taught many different eight-week courses on Yeats in the National Library of Ireland and this is his fourth immersion course on the poet. Along with the poetry of Yeats, he has a particular interest in teaching the literature of 20th century Ireland, as well as the drama and poetry of Shakespeare. He has also taught at Trinity College, UCD, the Institute of Public Administration and Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design and Technology.

BonoBruce Arnold Robert Ballagh John Banville Patrick Bergin Terence Brown Marina Carr Lorcan Cranitch Sinéad Cusack Polly Devlin Theo Dorgan Adrian Dunbar Roy Foster Gavin Friday Diarmuid Gavin Bob Geldof Alan Gilsenan Germaine Greer George Hamilton Josephine Hart Mark Hederman Bosco Hogan Anjelica Huston Jeremy Irons Jennifer Johnston Neil Jordan Billy Keane Brian Keenan John Kelly David Kelly Declan Kiberd Cerys Matthews Nell McCafferty Barry McGovern Kevin Myers David Norris Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin Edna O’Brien Mike Scott Fiona Shaw Colm Tóibín John Waters Kathleen Watkins Don Wycherley P

revi

ous

part

icip

ants

hav

e in

clu

ded:

Come away, O human child!To the waters and the wildWith a faery, hand in hand,For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand

Ticket Information

Lunchtime Events Commence at 1pm30 minutes durationAdmission Free

Evening EventsCommence at 8pmMax. duration 60 minutesAdmission €10 per event

One Day Immersion CourseFull DayAdmission €25

To Book: www.nli.ie

National Library of IrelandJune 8th - 24th 2011

A celebration of William Butler Yeats

Summer’s Wreath

National Library of IrelandKildare Street, Dublin 201 603 0200events@nli.iewww.nli.ie

View the exhibition Yeats: the life and works of William Butler Yeats at the National Library of Ireland, Kildare Street, Dublin 2 or online at www.nli.ie/yeats. Free guided tours on Wednesdays at 1pm.