CLARE County Library is once again participating in the annual Bealtaine festival, a national arts event, celebrating creativity in older age, now in its 19th year. The Clare Champion features prominently in this year’s programme.
Over 120,000 people take part in Bealtaine, with over 3,500 events happening all over Ireland during the coming weeks.
The Bealtaine festival provides an opportunity to communicate traditions between the generations, to try something new, to share talents or to come back to something you haven’t done for years.
This year, the theme for the festival is And Catch The Heart Off Guard, a phrase from Seamus Heaney’s poem, Postscript. Events will be held by Clare County Library to mark the festival throughout the month of May.
As with previous years, library events for Bealtaine are varied and widespread. All are free of charge and everyone is welcome.
There will be craft displays in Kilfinaghty Public Library in Sixmilebridge and the Dr Patrick J Hillery Library, Miltown Malbay; a cardmaking workshop in Sweeney Memorial Public Library in Kilkee; storytelling with Niall de Burca in Killaloe Public Library; Come Here Til I Tell Ya sessions with Cuimhneamh an Chláir, the Clare Oral History and Folklore Group, in Sean Lemass Public Library in Shannon; and a sugar craft demonstration by Geraldine Whelan in the De Valera Public Library in Ennis.
The library is also taking part in the Bealtaine Film Tour, which is presented by access>CINEMA, in partnership with the Irish Film Institute. This year’s films are Quartet (2012), starring Pauline Collins, Billy Connolly and Maggie Smith, and High Society (1956), starring Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra and Grace Kelly. Screenings will take place in branches in Ennis, Kilrush, Scariff and Shannon, where the library will be transformed into a cinema with a difference for your viewing pleasure.
Clare County Library will take a small section of the Local Studies Library on tour throughout the month of May, when library staff will visit nursing homes and day centres in various areas, including Ennis, Ennistymon, Tuamgraney and Newmarket-on-Fergus.
A selection of Clare Champion newspapers from times past will be transported, along with photographs and books, so that extracts can be read and discussed, evoking memories of times past. The newspapers are part of a complete set of Clare Champions dating back to 1903, which are housed at the Local Studies Centre on Harmony Row, Ennis. They are available to the public for reference use.
Bluebird Care has distributed copies of their Irish Pensioners Handbook to all branches of Clare County Library, while Aodhnaid Lennon, from Home Instead Senior Care, will provide talks and information displays in selected branches.
Senior citizens can avail of free library membership in all of Clare County Library’s branches.
For more information on the Bealtaine events and much more, visit Clare County Library’s website at www.clarelibrary.ie, phone 065 6821616 or contact your local library for screening times and further details.
A native of Ennis, Colin McGann has been editor of The Clare Champion since August 2020. Former editor of The Clare People, he is a journalism and communications graduate of Dublin Institute of Technology.