13 April,
In Conversation / Panel / Poetry /
Whales and Whales: Poetry in Translation
Sunday, 13 April 2025, 7:00pm
The Mick Lally Theatre / €12.00 | €10.00
Book NowWhales and Whales, described as ‘trembling poetry; an erratic wave, a magnificent and disturbing inner storm,’ is the first English translation of the pivotal Galician poetry collection by Luisa Castro. In Whales and Whales, Luisa navigates the journey of a young woman finding her place in the world. From her home on the North Galician coast, Castro’s ‘daughter of the sea’ casts off romantic clichés of love, labour, and girlhood, giving voice to irreverent desires and poignant awakenings. These poems reveal a young woman’s transformation in a society struggling to accommodate her.
Translated by Keith Payne, poet and author of Building the Boat (2023), this remarkable collection will be discussed by Luisa, Keith and Lorna Shaughnessy.
Luisa Castro is the author of nine collections of poetry and six novels. She has been awarded the King Juan Carlos Prize, The Hiperión Prize and the Herralde Prize, among others. She was Director of the Cervantes Institute in Naples (2012-2017) and Bordeaux (2017-2022), and is currently Director of the Cervantes Institute in Dublin (2022-present). She is a regular contributor to the Spanish newspaper El País and is celebrated as one of the most important voices in contemporary Galician poetry.
Keith Payne is the author of ten collections of poetry in translation and original poetry, most recently Savage Acres from Dedalus Press (April, 2025) and Building the Boat (Badly Made Books, 2023), as featured on BBC Radio 3’s The Essay. Whales and Whales, from the Galician of Luisa Castro, was published by Skein Press in April 2024. He is curator of the Aodh Ruadh Ó Domhnaill Poetry Exchange Ireland/Galicia. He shares his time between Ireland and Galicia.
