Catawba College's English Department invites the public to a reading by Irish poet Ann Leahy on at 7:30 p.m., Monday, October 12, in Tom Smith Auditorium. Leahy's appearance is made possible by a grant from Culture Ireland.
Leahy's debut poetry collection, The Woman who Lived her Life Backwards, published in 2008 by Arlen House, won the prestigious Patrick Kavanagh Award. Individual poems from the collection have also been recognized in a series of literary awards in Ireland and the UK, including the Poetry on the Wall Competition, the Clogh Writers’ Award, the Gerard Manley Hopkins award, and The New Writer award. In addition, her poems have been commended twice in the British National Poetry Competition and have been short-listed for a Hennessy Award (Ireland) and for the Hamish Canham Prize (UK).
Her poems have been published widely in magazines and anthologies in Ireland and internationally and have been broadcast on national radio. Some have been translated into Russian and Dutch.
Leahy grew up in Ireland in County Tipperary and lives in Dublin. For a number of years she worked as a lawyer in private practice. She now works in the management of a national not-for-profit organization.
Critical Praise for "The Woman who Lived her Life Backwards"
"It's fantastic. She has a very wry take on life," Gráinne Humphreys, talking to the Irish Times, 30 December 2008, about "The Woman who Lived her Life Backwards."
"Award-winning Leahy has been writing poetry for many years now and her work has been widely published in journals and anthologies, and even translated into Russian and Dutch ... This, surprisingly, is her first collection and it contains poems [that] reveal a sense of humour and a clever wit. She uses words craftily and produces puns that do not make the reader wince. [The poems…..] are refreshing in being celebratory and joyful ... This is a welcome collection which gives us a more positive image of the poet in Ireland." Books Ireland, Summer 2009, review of "The Woman who Lived her Life Backwards."
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