Pearse Street Library

To mark the occasion of Colum Mc Cann winning the 2011 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award with his book Let the Great World Spin, Pearse Street library played host to a reading by Colum McCann and a question and answer session between Niall McMonagle and the author. Here is a taster of what he had to say:

Niall: Early in the book the charismatic, mysterious John Andrew Corrigan we’re told his theme was happiness, what’s your theme?

Colum: I think my theme would be the possibility of grace in the face of all the other evidence that we see. The possibility of some sort of redemption. Many, many years ago I wrote a book called This Side of Brightness where I stayed with the homeless people that live in the subway tunnels of New York and these were people living in like really, really tough situations, you know, in little caves off to the side of the tracks in dirt and squalor and no matter what situation they were in every single one of those homeless people said to me "When I get out of here ...," not "if I get out of here" but "When I get out of here I will do such and such a thing".                                                               

                                                                                         (Photo: Jason Clark Photography)

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