Tramp Press author Sara Baume has been named Hennessy New Irish Writer 2015 at this year’s 44th annual Hennessy Literary Awards in Dublin. She also won the Emerging Fiction category for her short story ‘Dancing, or Beginning to Dance’.
We’re delighted for Sara, winning these two prestigious awards. Judge Martina Devlin talked to us all after the ceremony about the importance of Hennessy at the beginning of a writer’s career. The explosion of good wishes on Twitter, FB and in the emails that kept our phones buzzing all night really drove that home. Thank you to everyone – we’ll pass all your lovely messages on to Sara.
Henrietta McKervey won the Hennessy First Fiction winner for her story ‘The Dead of Winter’, and the Hennessy Emerging Poetry winner was Simon Lewis, for ‘Creosote; The Zoo, Cork, 1881; Two Sisters’. Poet Paula Meehan was inducted into the Hennessy Literary Awards Hall of Fame.
Sara Baume’s debut novel, Spill Simmer Falter Wither, was described by Joseph O’Connor in The Irish Times, as “a stunning and wonderful achievement by a writer touched by greatness. It is the most powerful debut novel I have read in several years.” You can buy it here.
The Hennessy New Irish Writing page appears in The Irish Times on the last Saturday of every month. The prize-winning stories and poems, and a gallery of photographs, can be viewed here.
Thanks to Hennessy and The Irish Times for a great night.