Mary Morrissy

Mary Morrissy is the author of four novels, Mother of Pearl, The Pretender, The Rising of Bella Casey and Penelope Unbound and three collections of stories, A Lazy Eye, Prosperity Drive and Twenty-Twenty Vision. Her short fiction has been anthologized widely and she has won a Hennessy Award and a US Lannan Foundation Award for her work. Her debut novel, Mother of Pearl, was shortlisted for the Whitbread Prize and she’s been nominated twice  for the Dublin Literary Award. A member of Aosdána, she is a journalist and has taught creative writing at university level in both Ireland and the US for the past 25 years. She was the associate director of creative writing at University College Cork until 2020. She now works as a literary mentor.  She curates a website dedicated to Dublin artist Una Watters (1918-1965), who will feature in her next book.. 

Mary’s participation in this year’s festival is supported by the Arts Council of Ireland and The Laureate for Irish Fiction programme as part of The Island of Imagination: A Literary Tour of Ireland