Five questions for Neil McCarthy
November 23, 2007
Neil McCarthy is a poet/writer based in the west of Ireland. He is the co-author of two chapbooks of poetry (Voicing the Bell and Naked in Vienna) and has performed as a guest speaker at, amongst other places, the Dylan Thomas Centre, Swansea; Federation Square, Melbourne; Poetry Ireland, Dublin; and also at the Prague Fringe Festival. He is poetry has featured in many journals worldwide including The New York Quarterly and Poetry Salzburg Review. Neil will read at the Bardroom on December 2.
1. Are you currently working on anything, and why’s it taking so long?
“I’m working on a second poetry collection and that’s coming along nicely, though I would never rush it or give myself a deadline. I’m also trying to finish a travel book/political history book which has so far taken four years to get to the final few chapters as I like to visit most of the countries I’m writing about.”
2. Do you actually have moments of inspiration or is writing just a process of slogging day in and day out?
“I think moments of inspiration get the ball rolling, but for me, fine tuning a poem is walking away from the initial furious effort, and coming back to it when experience has filled in the gaps.”
3. What’s the last thing you read that made your hair stand up on end?
“My credit card bill. No seriously, my mother’s will. No, no, seriously, it’s Patrick McCabe’s latest book ‘Winterwood’. What a piece of writing.”
4. Name a writer/poet who you’d be most psyched to see show up at your Bardroom gig and how would you return the compliment if he/she liked your set?
“I’d have to say Dennis O’Driscoll (Anvil/Bloodaxe). To quote the Irish poet Stephen Murray, ’some poets draw a fist, others shadow box around the point.’ Dennis knocks you out. Return the compliment? I’d buy the man a kebab.”
5. What would you have been if you hadn’t become a writer?
“Successful, rich and healthy.”
