The Narrative Journalism course being taught by essayist and journalist Donald Mahoney has filled. If you’d like to be part of a similar course in autumn, please contact Some Blind Alleys.
There are still spaces available on the Fiction and Personal Essay course being taught by Adrian Duncan. That course starts Wednesday, May 9, and runs tens weeks. Please read about it here.
Posted at 24th April 2012, by SBA
The Introduction to Fiction course has filled, but there are still spaces remaining for Donald Mahoney’s Narrative Journalism course as well as Adrian Duncan’s Fiction and Personal Essay course.
We’ve received a lot of queries about the Narrative Journalism course – principally by people who say it looks intriguing, but who say they have no interest in ‘journalism.’ The fact is, the word journalism has got a distinctly unfun sound to it, when we’re talking about creative writing evening courses. It also sounds like an impossible challenge, since many aspiring writers are introverts, and they assume journalists are all extroverts, or since many aspiring writers aren’t interested in hours and hours of long dull research, and a good journalist is never afraid of leafing through 200-page annual reports by the Office of Public Works. We want you to know that in this course, it is not necessary to ask any tough, uncomfortable questions of hostile subjects. And you will not have to leaf through a 200-page OPW report (unless you want to).
As Donald Mahoney writes in his course description, ‘journalism is nothing more than the act of bearing witness.’ If the personal essay’s mantra is ‘think something, say something,’ the mantra of the journalistic essay is ‘see something, say something.’ In the personal essay, we look inward, we struggle, and we discover. In the journalistic essay, we look outward, we observe, and we discover.
This course is ideal for two kinds of aspiring writer – those who have already taken a course or two at Some Blind Alleys, who are looking for a masterclass, and those who are truly interested in long-form journalism. Donald is one of the best narrative journalists currently at work in Ireland, and the fact that three of the last four Dublin Reviews have featured his work should not only tell you that he knows what he’s doing, but that there is somewhere here in Ireland where you can seek to publish what you produce in this class.
More broadly, and most importantly, this course is ideal for helping people with something to say about the world channel their ideas into a more critical form of writing.
It is often forgotten that so many of the world’s greatest writers honed their narrative craft and nurtured the moral urgency of their famous work by working as journalists. This is no accident. Aspiring writers should know that a great piece of long-form journalism is not much different than a great short story. Voice, plot, character are all essential components.
One does not need training or experience in the field of journalism to bear witness to these strange and troubling times and create living portraits of them, just curiosity and a hunger to tell the untold story.
If you think you might be interested but want to ask a question or two, please contact SBA using the Contact page. If you want to directly ask Donald a question, your email will be passed along to him.
Posted at 13th April 2012, by SBA
Some Blind Alleys has awarded Tom Mathew a financial grant of €2,500 for the purpose of continuing work in the field of autobiography. His winning essay, ‘That time I scattered ashes in India, under the impression that life had meaning,’ can be read here. Tom currently lives in London and has proposed to use the grant to fund an extended stay in Kerala in South India, where his father is from, and write a collection of essays about that part of the world. Tom was a former participant in the Some Blind Alleys Writing Workshops.
There were seven judges and one public vote. The public vote was weighted as one judge’s vote. The judges were Kevin Barry, Carlo Gébler, Claire Kilroy, Molly McCloskey, Belinda McKeon, Philip O Ceallaigh, and Keith Ridgway. All judges donated their time.
In order to be eligible for the grant, applicants had to publish an essay on Some Blind Alleys during 2011. A shortlist of four was chosen by SBA founder Greg Baxter.
Congratulations to Tom, and congratulations to the other finalists for their outstanding work.
Posted at 9th April 2012, by SBA
The announcement of the winner of the SBA Essay Grant will take place at 9pm, Wednesday, April 4, at the Duke on Duke Street, directly after the launch of The Apartment in Hodges Figgis. For those of you who can’t make it, the winner will be announced online the next day. Please come and take part. There’ll be a speech of sorts.
Here’s more about the SBA Essay Grant.
Here’s more about the launch of The Apartment.
Everyone is invited to both.
Posted at 3rd April 2012, by SBA
The recipient of the Some Blind Alleys Essay Grant has been decided. The margin was extremely narrow. The winner scored 26 points total and the runner-up scored 24 points (click here to read how the vote was tallied). Results have been independently verified by Dublin Review editor Brendan Barrington.
What is the SBA Essay Grant?
Some Blind Alleys is offering a financial grant of €2,500 to one author for the purpose of continuing work in the field of autobiography. There are seven judges and one public vote. The public vote is weighted as one judge’s vote. The judges are Kevin Barry, Carlo Gébler, Claire Kilroy, Molly McCloskey, Belinda McKeon, Philip O Ceallaigh, Keith Ridgway.
The recipient of the grant will be announced next week.
(We should take this opportunity to congratulate one of our judges, Kevin Barry, for just winning the world’d most lucrative short story prize.)
The finalists for the Essay Grant are:
Adrian Duncan
Chicken Lane: a walk through Stoneybatter
Tom Mathew
That time I scattered ashes in India, under the impression that life had meaning
Ryan Van Runkle
A sojourn in central Europe
Karl Whitney
Open space: walking the boundaries of Tallaght
Posted at 31st March 2012, by SBA
The first issue of The South Circular, an e-journal of short stories, is now on sale for just €3.00. Some Blind Alleys tutor Adrian Duncan has a story in it. If they are publishing Duncan, then they probably like high-quality, unorthodox stuff.
From the press release:
The South Circular, Ireland’s newest short story e-journal, publishes its first issue on 26 March 2012. Issue 1, available to download from www.thesouthcircular.com for just €3.00, features four stories by authors Eddie Stack, Eley Williams, Shane Hulgraine and Adrian Duncan.
The cover jacket features the work of young Irish illustrator and designer, Fuchsia Macaree.
The South Circular is now taking submissions for issue 2, due in June 2012. Authors may submit their work to submissions@thesouthcircular.com between 26 March and 16 April 2012. For submission guidelines, please visit: www.thesouthcircular.com/submit.
Posted at 26th March 2012, by SBA
The spring schedule for creative writing courses at Some Blind Alleys has been announced, and spaces are available for booking. SBA is offering three courses. Award-winning Irish novelist Keith Ridgway is teaching an Introduction to Fiction course (April 17), which will look at short stories and the novel. Ridgway, the author of three novels, a novella, and a collection of stories, will publish his new novel, Hawthorn & Child, this summer with Granta. His short stories have appeared in various magazines and journals in the US, the UK, and Ireland, including the New Yorker, Granta, Zoetrope, and the Dublin Review. SBA is also running a Narrative Journalism course (April 26), taught by regular Dublin Review contributor Donald Mahoney. Writer, critic, and visual artists Adrian Duncan – who’s been teaching courses at SBA since 2011 – will teach Fiction and Personal Essay (May 9).
To book, click the Paypal button beneath the course you want, and you’ll receive instant confirmation.
Please see the Courses & Workshops page for more details, or the SBA Tutors page to read more about Keith, Donald, and Adrian. If you have any questions, please contact Greg Baxter, the Director of the Workshops, via the SBA Contact page, or have a look at the About the Workshops page.
In the News: Some Blind Alleys has just appeared once again in the Irish Times.