I got an email this morning telling me that the Irish Writers’ Centre has had its Arts Council funding terminated, the text running thusly: Ireland’s writers protest at disturbing decision by the Arts Council of Ireland to terminate funding to the Irish Writers’ Centre with immediate effectOne or two points to be raised: (a) Does Ireland really enjoy the ‘leading position in World (sic) literature’? (b) Will the next generation of Irish authors really be left in a vacuum and left to look elsewhere for guidance and development? (c) Is the Irish Writers’ Centre – or any group or organisation – really required for new and talented writers to access the skills, resources and talents to further their work? (d) Will up-and-coming writers do as writers have always done, which is simply to read better writers and try to write as well as they, or perhaps even better? (e) Exactly how was the Arts Council grant to the IWC distributed? (f) Was the Arts Council correct to believe that core staff costs at the IWC were unnecessarily high, given that – according to the IWC’s previous director, Peter Sirr, writing in yesterday’s Irish Times – €237,550 was spent on the salaries of four staff members?
Ireland’s literary fraternity has been stunned by the decision by the Arts Council of Ireland to terminate with immediate effect all funding to the Irish Writers’ Centre. Their statement, signed by a number of Ireland leading authors, including Maeve Binchy, Booker prize winners, Roddy Doyle, John Banville and Anne Enright, acclaimed International authors Richard Ford and Will Self, leading novelists, Joseph O’Connor, Dermot Bolger, John Boyne and Sebastian Barry, poets Paul Muldoon, Derek Mahon, Paul Durcan, Ciaran Carson and Ireland’s Professor of Poetry Michael Longley and literary figures such as literary agent Jonathan Williams are amongst the 55 signatories on the statement that has been circulated to all the National newspapers in Ireland and the United Kingdom expressing their dismay at this disturbing decision and calling for the urgent reinstatement of funding.
The Irish Writers’ Centre, which Nobel laureate Seamus Heaney has called “a part of the literary culture”, and best selling author John Boyne has described as “a part of the fabric of literature in Ireland”, is the national development agency for the development of writers and writing in Ireland where one if its primary functions is to foster and develop new writing talent so as to maintain Ireland’s leading position in World literature.
Literature is a major part of Ireland’s social and cultural history. The Irish Writers’ Centre was a space that writers could call their own. It is the only centre in Dublin devoted to literature that can provide an in-house space for readings, literary events, festivals, creative writing courses, developmental works and was the home to a number of writers groups and National organisations such as the Irish Writers’ Union and the Irish Translators and Interpreters Association. With the termination of funding access to these resources will be lost, leaving the next generation of Irish authors in a vacuum and having to look elsewhere for guidance and development.
If Ireland is to maintain its position as a major literary country it needs to develop new and talented writers who have access to the necessary skills, resources and outlets to further their work which, with the termination of funding to the Irish Writers’ Centre, they will find increasingly difficult.
As a struggling writer with two novels published, and who never received so much as a single syllable’s worth of help, direction or access from the IWC, and who would be in seventh heaven if I could earn almost €60,000 per annum from writing, I’ll gladly support the petition to have the Arts Council’s grant reinstated if and when the IWC (a) make available and transparent the way in which said grant is spent by the IWC, and (b) if I can be convinced that the IWC will in the future display the kind of pro-active attitude to supporting all kinds of writing and writers, such as that displayed by the Arts Council.
4 comments:
There is a need for an Irish literary organisation - as a resource, for contacts, information, workshops, films - you name it - all under one body with a national remit.
The largest problems with the IWC is the lack of programming, national representation and the fact that the director is paying himself an annual salary of €120,000...
The IWC and other organisations could work together to create something that could genuinely help Irish writing at all levels. Instead - they've just been taking the money.
I always thought the fantastic thing about writing was that all you needed was a pen and paper - you don't need a band (in particular a mad drummer), you don't need a film crew, you just need a little bit of time. I don't quite know what the IWC does or did, certainly I've never come across it. Does it give out grants to writers? Does it act on behalf of writers the way the Society of Authors does in the UK (it's a bit old fashioned, but it does have clout)or is it there merely to promote 'literature', which seems to do pretty well all by itself?
Hmmm, this seems very dodgy to me. Knowing nothing about it, I went to the Centre's website, curious chiefly about the identity of its Director and about its origins. Standard stuff, one would think, but not to be found. I did eventually track down the Director, Cathal McCabe, a poet who was once the British Council's "Literature Consultant in Warsaw." I think Cathal likes the public teat. As of 2004 he was preparing the first collection of his own poetry, a volume of Polish poetry in translation, and a study of Derek Mahon, none of which, fours years later, could I find trace of, other than one essay on Mahon. The Centre doesn't seem to do anything except set up courses and related events in Creative Writing. That is not good. But the lack of anything about the genesis makes me suspect this is yet another secular prosperity church, Tabernacle of the Immaculate Prose Style, set up by one or a few individuals who snow public bodies and private foundations into giving them money. There was a lot of that sort of thing when the coffers were brimming. And as we see from the salaries of Cathal and his three colleagues, it is indeed prosperous for some. I am willing to bet a lot of those writers who have been protesting the end of its funding have never taken a close look at all this.
Philip - I honestly don't know anything about Cathal McCabe, and the issue has more to do with the organisation, I think, than any one individual.
I think it's fair to say that there's a perception of elitism about the IWC, and that it celebrates a certain kind of writer and writing.
Colin - You're right up to a point, squire. Writing is all about doing it yourself, but once the book is written, most writers need every bit of help they can get promoting the book. My argument is that the IWC doesn't help the majority of writers. To be fair, I don't know if its constitution specifically says what kind of writers and writing it's supposed to support.
I did a couple of pieces on the blog about crime writing gigs the IWC was hosting late last year, so they've obviously got a broad enough remit. In terms of being pro-active about following up on my boosting the gigs, though, they were non-existent. Surely somebody in there should have the job of following up on good press for their writers and / or gigs, even if it appears on a measly blog?
If they were supposed to be representing me, I'd certainly want them to do it.
Cheers, Dec
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