Search Results for 'Samuel Beckett'

Nora Barnacle left Galway early in 1904. She was 20 years old, a strong-willed girl running from a tyrannical uncle who disapproved of her latest boy friend. Within weeks of her arrival in Dublin she would become the muse and lover of James Joyce and the inspiration of some and his greatest works — Greta Conroy in The Dead, Bertha the common law wife in Exiles and Molly Bloom in Ulysses — all share some of Nora’s character and experiences. In October of that same year Nora and Jim would elope to Europe and in due course step on to the pages of literary history. She would return to her native city only twice during her 47 years of exile before dying in Zurich in 1951, having lived 67 tumultuous years.

The plan to build a new pedestrian bridge from the Left Bank to the Strand got a step closer this week after the town council adopted a plan for the improvement and upgrading of the town’s waterfront.

The Watergate Theatre, Kilkenny will host a production of Tenessee Williams’ classic play, The Glass Menagerie, as part of the show’s six venue national tour.

What is your idea of perfect happiness?

The queen had her annus horribilis, Himself had a weekus horribilis. We all did. His kidney stones were giving him jip. When you receive a call from your beloved’s colleague to say he has taken poorly and been rushed into hospital by bluelight taxi, (but don’t panic)... it’s not good. The mind goes into overdrive and we all know the mind’s a powerful thing. Flat to the mat down the M40 to find the hospital. Phone goes on the blink leaving me incommunicado. Then the SatNav gives me the two fingers and decides to pack it in, just to add to the mix. I cannot find the hospital and feel like the Connemara man...which way in here is owit! I don’t know who is collecting the kids. It’s very hard to cry and drive at the same time. The words of my hero Samuel Beckett spring to mind, ‘Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.’ So, no matter, A&E was found.

Local author Desmond Egan launches his new book Athlone Athlone, with photographs by Noel Finnerty, this weekend.

Without Mick Lally’s input and support, Druid Theatre Company might “never have existed”. So said Druid artistic director Garry Hynes, who paid tribute to the much loved actor who died this week.

Kilkenny’s first All-Ireland medal is to be auctioned at the end of that month by a Kilkenny auctioneer.

This year’s Galway Arts festival succeeds yet again in giving some insight into the minds of remarkable artists whose personal magic interprets our world. These include international journalists Niall O’Dowd, John Lancaster, several writers including Bret Easton Ellis, and the renowned theatre and opera director Sir Peter Hall. On Saturday afternoon, the playwright and poet Frank McGuinness teased out some paths through the labyrinthine mind of Ireland’s leading painter Brian Bourke.

What is your idea of perfect happiness?