Novelist Paul Theroux to head up Lismore literary event

Internationally acclaimed novelist and travel writer Paul Theroux will head up the 11th annual Immrama Festival of Travel Writing in Lismore in Co Waterford later this summer.

Theroux, author of novels such as The Mosquito Coast and My Other Life, has also won much critical acclaim for his travel writings such as Ghost Train to the Eastern Star.

He is scheduled to take the stage at Immrama on June 15th, when he will read from his most recent work, The Last Train To Zona Verde: My Ultimate African Safari.

Also appearing at this year's festival is British journalist and broadcaster Simon Winchester OBE, who took up journalism after reading the works of Immrama regular, Jan Morris.

Winchester worked for the Guardian in Northern Ireland in the 1970s and covered Bloody Sunday and the introduction of internment, which he later chronicled in In Holy Terror.

Falkland Islands

He also worked for the Sunday Times and was on the Falkland Islands when they were invaded by Argentina. He ended up being imprisoned for three months.

Among the other writers to feature in this year's festival is broadcaster Charlie Connelly, the author of Attention All Shipping: A Journey Around the Shipping Forecast.

This year's festival also marks a kind of homecoming for two 18th century travellers who both began their careers as clergymen in the Diocese of Waterford and Lismore.

Richard Pococke became Bishop of Ossory and Meath and his cousin, Jeremiah Milles, became Dean of Exeter. Rachel Finnegan will discuss their writings at St Carthage's Cathedral.

For further information on this year's Immrama Festival, running in

Lismore from June 13th to 16th, please visit lismoreimmrama.com.