Celebrating the Arts & Creativity as we age at Clare County Library for the 2019 Bealtaine Festival

Age & Opportunity’s Bealtaine Festival takes place annually throughout the month of May right across the country and is Ireland’s national celebration of the arts and creativity as we age. The theme for the 2019 Festival is 'Hospitality – Be Our Guest!' so, we invite you to be our guest as we celebrate with a host of events in our branches throughout the county.

We kick off on Friday, 3rd May at 5pm with an evening of entertainment in Cultúrlann Sweeney, Kilkee as singer-songwriter John Spillane presents his popular show Irish Songs We Learned at School. This is a free, but ticketed, event in association with Clare Arts Office. Bookings can be made at the Cultúrlann Sweeney box office or by phoning 065 9060769.

Other events throughout the month will include movie screenings as part of the Bealtaine Film Tour in association with access>CINEMA and the Irish Film Institute. The chosen films for this year’s tour are Finding Your Feet (2018), Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) and Movie Memories (a 2018 project supported by Creative Ireland, Cork County Council and University College Cork). Branches in Ennis, Ennistymon, Killaloe, Kilrush, Scariff, Shannon and Sixmilebridge will host screenings. Details of location, date and time for all screenings are available on the library website and social media.

Kilrush and Kilkee libraries are hosting a 6 week Creative Writing Workshop with Breda Shannon spanning dates in April and May. Kilkee Library will also hold an intergenerational knitting circle for seniors and children from Kilkee Primary School on Tuesday 14th May.

There will also be craft displays in Miltown Malbay Library from Tuesday 7th to Saturday 18th May inclusive and in Sixmilebridge Library during the month, with items created by the library adult knitting group, while Ennistymon Library will host an art display by the Stella Maris Day Centre throughout the month.

In Shannon Library the Non Nobis Domine Choir with conductor Clem Garvey will entertain an audience with a varied programme of folk songs, church music and more on Friday, 17th May at 7pm. Storytime with Granny and Grandad will take place on Tuesday, 28th May at 4pm when grannies and grandads are invited to bring their grandchildren along to the library to hear some stories featuring grandparents and the special relationship they have with their grandchildren. Suitable for children aged 3-6 years and grandparents of all ages!

Corofin Library will host a tea/coffee morning with readings by local people on Wednesday 15th May from 10.30am-12 noon. All welcome.

In 2019, the Bealtaine Book Club author is Éilís Ní Dhuibhne and the chosen Bealtaine Book is her memoir Twelve Thousand Days (2018) published by Blackstaff Press. We will run special events based on the book throughout the month, including a competition in branches and on the Library’s Facebook page for three lucky book clubs to win copies of the book, culminating with a review of the book during the monthly book club slot on Clare FM’s Morning Focus programme with Gavin Grace at the end of the month.

Details of all events will be published on the Library Events section of the Clare County Library website at www.clarelibrary.ie and on their social media platforms. All events are free of charge but booking may be required. Details of Bealtaine events nationwide can be viewed on www.bealtaine.com.

Clare County Library Springs Into Storytime

The national Spring into Story-time Initiative is now in its second year with a celebration of reading and stories taking place in all libraries in Ireland during the month of April. Clare County Library branches are busy hosting a range of story-time events for young children with art and crafts and other reading-based play activities featuring in these fun family gatherings.

Another project focusing on family reading came to a close at deValera Library Ennis on the morning of the 11th of April when a special reception for children of 1st class from Holy Family Junior School, Ennis took place. Partnering with the Clare Family Learning Coordinator, Limerick and Clare Education and Training Board (lcetb), and teachers from the school, the library service provided books and library activities to support the workshops. This all-inclusive initiative brought parents, children, teachers, storytellers and librarians together to improve oral language and communication skills through sharing books and stories.

Over the past six weeks a collection of tried and trusted picture books was made available by Clare County Library to children and their parents. The stories were specifically chosen with the underlying aim of improving children’s communication, social and language skills. The story sessions were facilitated to the delight of the children, by professional storyteller Ruth Marshall who has extensive experience in storytelling in schools and community groups for many years. At each class there was a special emphasis on how parents can use books to help develop oral language.

The final celebratory event at deValera Library Ennis offered all adults involved an opportunity to evaluate and provide feedback on the project with a view to extending it to other schools in the future.

The collaboration between Clare County Library, Clare Family Learning Project, and the Home School Community Liaison (HSCL) Scheme at Holy Family Junior School Ennis is in keeping with the Government’s Right to Read policy, the primary aim of which is to create an integrated and sustained approach to developing literacy in the local community.

Clare County Library joining forces with Dublin One City One Book to honour Edna O’Brien

Clare County Library is proud to participate in this year’s Dublin One City One Book Festival to honour renowned Clare-born author Edna O’Brien and celebrate her work, The Country Girls Trilogy. The Country Girls Trilogy joins a long list of illustrious titles as this year’s featured book in the Dublin One City One Book Festival, which is a Dublin City Council initiative, led by Dublin City Public Libraries, which encourages everyone to read a book connected with the capital city during the month of April each year.

Published by Faber & Faber, this volume is introduced by Eimear McBride and includes The Country Girls and its sequels The Lonely Girl and Girls in Their Married Bliss, which changed the temperature of Irish literature in the 1960s and inspired generations of readers and writers. The passion, artistry and courage of Edna O’Brien’s vision in these novels continue to resonate into the 21st century.

At the launch of this year’s Festival, Edna O’Brien said: “I worked in Dublin as an apprentice pharmacist from 1948 to 1952, so it’s where I first encountered literature and set out on the very secret and profane matter of writing The Country Girls Trilogy. I never dreamed the Trilogy would last so long or make it to this winning post. I am delighted and hope for new readers who won’t have to hide it under the bed covers as they did in the sixties and onwards….Dublin has given me longevity.”

Clare County Library invites library book clubs, library members, and anyone who is interested, to read The Country Girls Trilogy. The book is available to borrow from libraries and can be downloaded as an eBook from the library’s free Borrowbox app or it can be bought in bookshops. It is available in audio book format and has been produced in Braille by the National Council for the Blind of Ireland.

Clare County Library will present a special book club event in Scariff Public Library on Thursday, 18th April 2019 at 6.30pm, celebrating Edna O'Brien and The Country Girls Trilogy. This free event will be hosted by Dr. Tina O'Toole, a senior lecturer in English and programme director of the MA English at the University of Limerick, who will give a talk with a Q&A afterwards. Everyone is welcome to this event but booking is required as numbers are limited. Phone Scariff Library on 061 922893 for bookings and more information.

In mid-April a number of “Country Girls “ from Clare County Library’s staff will take a day trip to Dublin as special invitees at a Dublin One City One Book event hosted by Rick O’Shea & Rachel English in Pearse Street Library. This is one of a host of events happening across the capital as part of the Festival throughout April. Details of all events can be found at www.dublinonecityonebook.ie.

The Country Girls Trilogy is also the April choice for the monthly library book club slot on Clare FM’s Morning Focus programme and will be discussed with Gavin Grace towards the end of the month.

Creative Ireland Project Awards

Creative Ireland Project Awards were recently allocated by Creative Ireland Clare. The Creative Ireland Clare vision is ‘to ensure the people of Clare discover and have access to cultural expression through creative activity’. Nine projects were granted Project Awards in 2019. These include a coming-of-age drama ‘Radha’ which will be made in Clare with actor/writer/director Sonya O’Donoghue. Other innovative pieces include the “Creating Local Solutions to Climate Change” project with Mary Immaculate Secondary School and the local North Clare community and a folklore and well-being project working with Burren schools and older community members with Eilís Haden-Storrie.

Awards were also given to the Musicale Festival in Cultúrlann Sweeney, Kilkee organised by Music Generation Clare, Cumann Merriman Winter School and Éigse Thomáis Uí Aodha with Oidhreacht an Chláir. An Art Studio project for people with disabilities with courses in painting, ceramics and drama working with Sophie Delaney, Will O’Kane and Pat Looney received funding while Sparks Youth Film Festival in Scariff plan to run secondary school film workshops and primary school animation workshops in the lead-up to the Festival. Finally, a ‘Ploughing Ahead’ project in Mountshannon with Mark Wilson aims to produce a sculptured seating area designed, developed and produced by and with the local community.