This month Trasna is featuring writers participating in Words Ireland National Mentoring Programme. Every year, 22 emerging writers are selected for the program in the areas of literary fiction, creative non-fiction, children’s/YA fiction, and poetry. Each are paired with mentors. Featured this week is poet Billy Fenton. On participating in Words Ireland, he…
Eagle River Virus By Mike McCormick I’m sitting on my deck listening to the ebullient calls of ruby-crowned kinglets as they flit from branch to branch high atop birch and spruce trees. My wife Katy is transplanting geraniums from inside our arctic entry room to outdoor flower boxes. We are…
Diary in the Time of Coronavirus (8) by Paul Hudon May 31 In Consciousness, his only volume of memoirs, John Updike proposes two life-defining questions. First, Why me? Second, Why here? Identity and place. He paired the right questions, only, being Updike, he put them back to front. Place comes first…
My co-blogger Marie Sweeney writes about making slumgullion at home. The first time I read that word I knew I had to work it in to a poem. Turns out the dish she makes (and a lot of us make) has a bunch of names. I only knew it as…
Orchardist and artist Linda Hoffman writes about fruit in this post from her blog on May 31. Blueberries on the way. And here’s her latest post from June 7 about the way water moves on Old Frog Pond Farm in Harvard, Mass. Early Morning Pond View, 2020, watercolor (Linda…
This month Trasna is featuring writers participating in Words Ireland National Mentoring Programme. Every year, 22 emerging writers are selected for the program in the areas of literary fiction, creative non-fiction, children’s/YA fiction, and poetry. Each are paired with mentors. Featured this week is poet Martina Dalton. On participating in Words Ireland,…
Jack McDonough had a long career in academic and corporate communications and the media as a writer and editor. He proudly identifies as an “ink-stained wretch.” Our readers know him as an occasional contributor to this blog and as a past essayist for the Sunrise public-affairs radio program at UMass…
Diary in the Time of Coronavirus (7) by Paul Hudon 24 May, 2020 ‘The fitful apprehension of history’ is a phrase I picked up four years ago come September. Apparently it was coined by Fredric Jameson, “an American Marxist philosopher.” This poses a problem because the phrase could be very…
The Hill of Uisneach may not appear in many travel guides, but local historian Mawie Barrett explains why this ancient and sacred site in the geographic center of Ireland is not to be missed. Photo: Fergus Hogan As May filters into June, it is an appropriate time to offer an…
Bette Davis was born in Lowell on April 15, 1908. She went on to a long and legendary career as one of Hollywood’s greatest actresses and an international star. Nominated for an Academy Award ten times, including a stretch of five consecutive years, she won twice. The family home, a…
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