2026 Writer in Residence Dean Browne continues his impressive winning streak with a third major award for his superb debut collection After Party.

'I loved doing it, it was a huge pleasure,' said the author. 'I was going down to Cork every week for two nights at one point, and I became very fond of UCC and the city.'

Connolly’s PhD supervisor was Dr Eibhear Walshe, the esteemed writer and director of the creative writing department at UCC, who died suddenly in the summer of 2024. 

'I was his last PhD student and he had just signed off on it. I was very upset, I was hugely fond of him, he was an exceptional person, a sweet, brilliant man. He wore his brilliance very lightly and those people are quite rare. Part of my thesis was to do a memoir semester with him, which opened up all kinds of ways of writing to me. I will always be grateful to him and UCC.'

Our Writer in Residence is on a roll! At Listowel Writers' Week, Dean Browne was announced as the winner of the Pigott Poetry Prize, one of Ireland's most prestigious poetry awards, for his debut collection After Party. The stellar shortlist also included Jessica Traynor and Bernard O'Donoghue.

Co-curated by creative writing lecturer Danny Denton, the festival runs from 12-21 June and includes writers such as Chetna Maroo, Pat McCabe, Thomas Morris, Doireann Ní Ghríofa, Billy Ramsell and Adania Shibli

Browne, who is this year’s writer-in-residence at UCC, his alma mater, describes himself as a full-time poet who has a Master’s degree in English but is most definitely not in an ivory tower