‘Letters From A Recalcitrant Woman’ by Drogheda based writer, Marie MacSweeney will be launched at High Lanes Gallery, Laurence Street, Drogheda at 8pm on Thursday, November 28th. All are welcome. It is Marie’s fourth book and is a unique and absorbing collection of letters to Editors and Talk Show Hosts, dating from 1974 to 2013.
A ‘Kerrywoman born in Dublin and living in County Louth’, as she describes herself, Marie has, over a period of forty years, engaged in public debate by means of Letters to the Editor and Emails to current affairs programmes. Here you will find old and new comment on topics as diverse as blasphemy, capital punishment, the Paisleys, peanuts, Bertie’s make-up, the Irish language, divorce, cruelty to animals, Adam and Eve, St. Patrick, Marilyn Monroe and much more. Best known for her short stories and poems, Marie wrote her first letter to the press over four decades ago. Since then she has written on a variety of topics and taken part in some significant controversies. In reading these letters today it becomes obvious that she always had something specific to say and said it frankly and sincerely. Hers is a unique voice which both challenges and subverts. It is unlikely that the reader will agree with everything in this book, but will undoubtedly conclude that she argues well, and entertains.
Marie MacSweeney has published ‘Our Ordinary World and Other Stories’ (2004). She also published two collections of poems, ‘Mother Cecily’s Music Room’ (2005) and ‘Flying During the Hours of Darkness’ (2009). Her stories and plays have been transmitted by RTE Radio One, where she also broadcasts occasional talks.
Copies, which cost €12.00, can be posted out to readers. Enquiries please ring 087-2668562
“I congratulate you on producing a fine and valuable social document.” Tom Martin
“There are no clichés and this is her own voice.” Eamon Cooke.
The cover which has received a lot of attention, has a picture by Ciaran Cosgrave.
