Visitors attend a book talk at the Seoul Metropolitan Library, Oct. 26, held as part of the Ireland Literature Festival Korea 2024. From left are Irish writers Anne Griffin, Sinead Gleeson, Ronan Hession and Michelle Winthrop, Irish Ambassador to Korea. (Seoul Metropolitan Library)
In its final few weeks, the Seoul Outdoor Library was transformed into a Travel Library, with weekly programs themed around different countries.
The journey began with Denmark in May and continued through Colombia in August, with each week offering unique cultural experiences tied to that week's country. Programs included curated book selections, film screenings, live music, or author talks, all designed to capture the spirit of each destination.
In October, the Travel Library resumed, beginning with Peru in the first week and concluding with Ireland as the final destination on Oct. 26, celebrated through the Ireland Literature Festival Korea 2024 in collaboration with the Irish Embassy in Seoul.
The Republic of Ireland, home to celebrated Nobel laureates and beloved literary giants like James Joyce, Oscar Wilde, George Bernard Shaw, W.B. Yeats and Samuel Beckett, has a remarkable history of storytelling. Today, a new generation of Irish authors like Claire Keegan and Sally Rooney is making its mark on the global literary stage.
From left, Irish writers Anne Griffin, Sinead Gleeson and Ronan Hession attend a book talk at the Seoul Metropolitan Library, held as part of the Ireland Literature Festival Korea 2024. (Hwang Dong-hee/The Korea Herald)
Three writers from Dublin -- Anne Griffin, Sinead Gleeson and Ronan Hession -- visited Seoul, where they shared their insights on Ireland's rich literary culture, rooted in a strong storytelling tradition and supported by robust governmental backing.
“We have a strong reading culture. And writers are a subset of readers. If you read deeply and widely, you develop a rich literary culture,” said Hession, novelist and also critic, whose latest book is "Ghost Mountain."
He added that Irish readers and writers maintain "a respect -- but not too much respect -- for literature," enabling them to honor their literary forebearers while forging their own paths.
Gleeson, who recently published her debut novel "Hagstone" after her acclaimed essay collection "Constellations: Reflections from Life," agreed.
“If you look back at our culture and history, we have a tradition of bards and poets being taken seriously by the higher echelons of society,” she said. “Even when we went through terrible times like the famine, poverty and British colonization, people would do what was called ‘ceilidh.’ It’s an Irish tradition of traveling to houses and telling stories.”
From left, Irish writers Anne Griffin, Sinead Gleeson and Ronan Hession and Michelle Winthrop, Irish Ambassador to Korea, attend a book talk at the Seoul Metropolitan Library, held as part of the Ireland Literature Festival Korea 2024. (Seoul Metropolitan Library)
In comparing Ireland to Korea, Hession noted the shared history of colonization and the subsequent rapid modernization.
“In both Irish and Korean literature, you get this sense of what has been won and lost -- people who have been left behind or marginalized, values that have changed, who is included in modernity and who is not. These are the kinds of questions that I think writers in both our countries are thinking about quite deeply.”
Another factor behind Ireland’s continued literary success, according to the writers, is the strong support from the government. Its Arts Council provides systemic backing through grants, bursaries and stipends to writers and literary journals, fostering a thriving creative ecosystem.
“I also think in Ireland the seriousness that writing is treated with is reflected in the way the government of Ireland treats writers,” said Gleeson. “I know a lot of literary journals, small independent presses would not exist without the funding that they get from the Irish government.”
Griffin, known for her bestseller “When All is Said,” echoed the appreciation. “There is a general respect in the Irish community for writers and it is an honor to be able to be a part of an industry that allows us to express who we are, allows us to express what is inside of us and allows me as a reader to see myself and my life reflected back by another writer,” she said.
Michelle Winthrop, Irish Ambassador to Korea said, “Words, stories, imagination, creativity -- these are all in the Irish DNA. Even those of us who have never written bestselling novels, we still pride ourselves on being able to tell a good story, on being able to make our listeners laugh or make them cry.”
From left, the Anne Griffin's "The Island of Longing," Sinead Gleeson's "Hagstone" and Ronan Hession's "Ghost Mountain" (Sceptre, 4th Estate and Bluemoose Books)
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