A Creative Writing Workshop for Teenagers with Stephen James Smith
For this workshop Stephen will focus on his method for writing about people and place.
Here are poems fueled by the raw urgency of language leaping to meet the world — and here, too, are poems of a tender heart, always willing to reach out, to try to understand. Stephen James Smith is a poet of uncommon energy, utterly alive to the here and now.
Stephen James Smith is a Dublin poet and playwright central to the rise of the vibrant spoken word scene in Ireland today. To date, his poetry videos have amassed over 3 million views online.
In 2017 he was commissioned by St. Patrick’s Festival to write a new poem as a “celebratory narrative” of Ireland. The resultant piece ‘My Ireland’ is accompanied by a short film by Director Myles O’Reilly, arranged and mixed by Conor O’Brien (Villagers), with music by Colm Mac Con Iomaire, Loah, Saint Sister, Eithne Ní Chatháin (aka Inni-K) and Ye Vagabonds. It has been viewed over 300,000 times online and was screened at the London Film Festival in Trafalgar Square on March 17th. The poem was in many ways a follow on from Smith’s previous poetry video Dublin You Are, which itself clocked up in excess of 250k views.
Stephen has performed his poetry at high profile events and festivals around the world and in 2012 he was invited to perform for the Irish Olympic team in London. In October 2018 Stephen appeared on a special edition of The Late Late Show (RTE Television) live from London, where he recited his poem ‘This Community’ to a TV audience of 1.1 million. Stephen has featured in several documentaries for television such as RTÉ’s IFTA Award Winning documentary ‘WB Yeats: No Country for Old Men’. He has received numerous poetry video commissions from Listowel Writers’ Week, Creative Ireland and the London Irish Centre to name but a few.
20th November/3.00pm
St Patrick's Gateway Centre, Waterford
Entry €5 | Tickets