Ciaran Carson on tour in the U.S. next month

The poet Ciaran Carson in Royal Avenue, Belfast, N.Ireland.

We are pleased to announce that Ciaran Carson will be on tour in the U.S. this November. If you’ve never had the opportunity to see him read his work, you’re in for a treat. His lively readings combine poetry with traditional Irish music, making for a delightful and festive evening. A quick search on YouTube will turn up videos that will give you a taste of what you can expect (this is one of our favorites, a gem from 1983!). What’s more, all events are free and open to the public, so we hope you’ll attend if you’re near any of these locations. Details of his stops are as follows:

Monday, Nov. 2, 7 p.m.
Poetry Foundation
61 West Superior Street
Chicago, IL
More info

Wednesday, Nov. 4, 7 p.m.
Wake Forest University
Ring Theatre, Scales Fine Arts Center
1834 Wake Forest Road
Winston-Salem, NC
More info

Saturday, Nov. 7, 6 p.m.
PoetryFest, Irish Arts Center
Donaghy Theatre, 553 West 51st
New York, NY
More info

Ciaran Carson is a highly acclaimed poet, also known for translation and prose. He’s a traditional Irish musician and scholar of the Irish oral tradition, and for years he has played flute accompanied by his wife, the accomplished Irish fiddler Deirdre Shannon. He is the author of fifteen collections of poetry, including the critically acclaimed Belfast Confetti (1989); First Language (1994), which won the first-ever T. S. Eliot Prize; and Breaking News (2003), which won the prestigious Forward Prize for Best Collection. His most recent volume, From Elsewhere (2015), contains translations of the French poet Jean Follain paired with Carson’s original responses, creating a unique conversation between two poets across space and time. Born and raised in Belfast, Carson was educated at Queen’s University there. He was appointed poetry chair at the University’s Seamus Heaney Centre for Poetry in 2003.