AN TOBAR/EL MANANTIAL/ THE WELL
a festival of poetry to honour and explore the bonds between Ireland and Spain
An té théas chun tobair, tuigeadh sé an tochailt
Los que bebemos del pozo, no hemos de olvidar a aquellos que lo cavaron
Those who drink from the well must never forget those who dug it
The Irish Embassy in Madrid, in collaboration with John Liddy and Matthew Loughney, have for many years organised a weekend festival of poetry in Madrid called El Manantial. This year, Liddy has decided to bring the festival to the University of Limerick as part of The Gathering.
You are invited to attend this unique event on Saturday 3rd August, 2013, at 5pm in the University of Limerick. Spanish poet Beatriz Villacañas will join John and Liam Liddy in a reading from past events of the festival. Piper Micky Dunne will play a selection of tunes.
Looking forward to seeing you. Please show this invitation at entrance.
Entrada libre hasta completar aforo.
Autobiographical Notes
Liam Liddy was born in Limerick. Educated at the CBS school, he later graduated from University College Dublin with a degree in English Literature and Philosophy. His poems have been published in literary journals on both sides of the Atlantic. In 2004 his novel Limerick Junction was published. He has been translating both poetry and prose for many years and is former editor of the bilingual literary journal The Stony Thursday Book/Cuaderno de Madrid. He lives and works in Spain, where he teaches English as a foreign language in the Universidad Nebrija. He is married and has two children.
Beatriz Villacañas is a poet essayist and literay critic. She was born in Toledo (Spain). She is a Doctor in English Philology and Senior Lecturer at Universidad Complutense of Madrid, where she teaches English and Irish Literature. She is also a member of the Real Academia de Bellas Artes y Ciencias Históricas of Toledo. She has lived in Ireland and England, where she taught Spanish, and has translated poetry by Shakespeare, W.B.Yeats, Brendan Kennelly, Michael Hartnett and Seamus Heaney.
Her poetry books: Jazz, 1991 Allegra Byron, 1993 El Silencio está lleno de Nombres (Silence is Full of Names), 1995 Dublín, 2001 El Ángel y la Física (The Angel and Physics) 2005 La gravedad y la manzana (Gravity and the Apple), 2011 Testigos del asombro -Haikus para diferentes horas- (Witnesses of Amazement -Haiku for Different Times- 2013 She has won important poetry awards such as Premio Internacional Ciudad de Toledo and Premio Bienal Internacional Eugenio de Nora, among others. Some of her academic books: Los Personajes Femeninos en las Novelas de Thomas Hardy (Female Characters in the Novels of Thomas Hardy), 1991, La Poesía de Juan Antonio Villacañas: Argumento de una Biografía (The Poetry of Juan Antonio Villacañas: Theme of a Biography), 2003, Mirando hacia la isla occidental:Primera aproximación a la literatura irlandesa ( Looking towards the Western Island: A First Glance at Irish LiteratureIrish Literature), 2002, Literatura Irlandesa (Irish Literature), 2007. Together with the Irish poet and translator Michael Smith she has selected and translated poems by Juan Antonio Villacañas: Juan Antonio Villacañas: Selected Poems, Shearsman Books.
She has been invited poet at An Tobar/ The Well: Irish and Spanish Poets Encounters in different years in Madrid and at Féile na Bealtaine, International Poetry Festival, Dingle, 2007. BeatrizVillacañas appears in a number of national and international poetry anthologies and has lectured and given poetry readings in Spain and other countries such as Ireland and Mexico.
Last February she was invited to give a lecture at the Royal Irish Academy, Dublin, on occasion of Ireland’s European Presidency.
John Liddy was born Youghal, Co Cork, Ireland (1954), grew up in Limerick, took a degree in the University of Wales, works as a teacher in Madrid. His poetry books include: Boundaries (1974); The Angling Cot (1991); Song of the Empty Cage(1997); Wine and Hope (1999); Cast-A-Net (2003); The Well: New and Selected Poems (2007); Gleanings (2010); Some Light Reading & A Song (2012).
His translations include: La Barca de la Arena (2010), a translation by Francisco Rivero in Spanish of The Angling Cot; Ivy Down (2010), a translation by Liddy from Spanish into English of Tosigo Ardento by José Maria Álvarez (2010) and of Diamond Bird by Rocío Álvarez Albizuri (2012).
In 2011, Cuentos Cortos en Inglés, a collection of stories for children in English and Spanish, was published.
He is the founding editor along with Jim Burke of The Stony Thursday Book, one of Ireland’s longest running literary reviews, along with Cyphers.
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