Novelist and Dramatist Lucy Caldwell Awarded Rooney Prize 2011

Posted on: 26 October 2011

The Rooney Prize for Irish Literature for 2011 was awarded to Lucy Caldwell, in recognition of her achievement and outstanding promise as a novelist and dramatist. The announcement was made by the Provost of Trinity College Dublin, Dr Patrick Prendergast at a reception in the Residence of the Ambassador of the United States of America to Ireland last night (October 25th 2011).

Lucy Caldwell was born in Belfast in 1981.  She read English at Queens’ College Cambridge and took her MA in Creative and Life Writing at Goldsmiths College, London. She has published two novels: Where They Were Missed (2006) and The Meeting Point (2011). Her plays have been performed at the Royal Court Theatre and by the BBC.

Provost, Dr Patrick Prendergast, Lucy Caldwell, Patricia Rooney and Dr Daniel M. Rooney

Previous winners of the Rooney Prize include Bernard Farrell, Neil Jordan, Frank McGuinness, Deirdre Madden and Anne Enright.

The selection committee this year comprised: Dr Terence Brown, Chair of the selection committee, critic and author (Fellow Emeritus, TCD); Gerald Dawe poet, critic and editor (Director, The Oscar Wilde Centre for Irish Writing, TCD);  Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin, poet, critic and editor (Associate Professor School of English, TCD); Dr Éilís Ní Dhuibhne, novelist and dramatist; Carlo Gébler, novelist and dramatist; Dr Riana O’Dwyer critic and editor (Department of English, National University of Ireland at Galway)

Commenting on the significance of Lucy’s work Dr Brown said she addresses difficult personal issues in complex cultural settings with a rare combination of sensitivity and acute intelligence.

The Rooney Prize is administered by Oscar Wilde Centre for Irish Writing, School of English, Trinity College Dublin.

About the Rooney Prize:

The Rooney Prize is awarded through the generosity of Dr Daniel M. Rooney of the Pittsburgh Steelers in the USA  and his wife, Patricia.  Dr Rooney is Ambassador of the United States of America to Ireland.   The Prize was established in 1975 and is awarded annually to a published Irish writer under forty whose work the selection committee considers shows outstanding promise.