Janice Galloway & Ben Okri. Monday 23 March, 8.00pm

The Black Box, 18 – 22 Hill Street, Belfast

Part of Between The Lines 2009

Janice Galloway

Born in Ayrshire (1955), Janice Galloway ’s first novel, The Trick is to keep Breathing (1990), was shortlisted for the Whitbread First Novel Award; its stage adaptation was widely performed. Her short stories Blood (1991) was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year and Foreign Parts (1994) won the McVitie’s Prize in 1994 when she was awarded the E M Forster Award. Janice Galloway ’s story-collection Where you find it (1996) was followed by the play Fall, performed in Edinburgh and Paris (1998), and Monster, the opera exploring the life of Mary Shelley, was premiered by Scottish Opera (2002). Galloway ’s novel Clara (2002) won the Saltire Book of the Year; Rosengarten (2003), her collaboration with Anne Bevan exploring obstetric implements and the history of birthing, is now part of the permanent collection of the Hunterian Museum. Janice Galloway has worked as a writer in residence for four Scottish prisons; her radio work for the BBC has been highly acclaimed. This is not about me (2008) is Janice Galloway ’s most recent book.

Ben Okri

Ben Okri was born in Nigeria (1959) where his first two novels, Flowers and Shadows (1980) and The Landscapes Within (1981), are set. Having read Comparative Literature he became poetry editor for West Africa magazine and broadcast regularly for the BBC World Service before being appointed Fellow Commoner in Creative Arts at Trinity College Cambridge and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Two collections of stories followed, Incidents at the Shrine (1986) and Stars of the New Curfew (1988); the novel The Famished Road (1991), the first in a trilogy that includes Songs of Enchantment (1993) and Infinite Riches (1998), won the Booker Prize. Other recent fiction includes Astonishing the Gods (1995); Dangerous Love (1996) was awarded the Premio Palmi (Italy). His latest novels are In Arcadia (2002) and Starbook (2007); the poetry includes An African Elegy (1992) and an epic poem, Mental Flight (1999). A collection of essays, A Way of Being Free, was published in 1997. Ben Okri is also the author of a play, In Exilus. His latest book, Tales of Freedom (2009), brings together poetry and story. Ben Okri is a Vice-President of the English Centre of International PEN and was awarded an OBE in 2001. He lives in London.

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