Dromineer Nenagh Literary Festival to recall epic journey down the mighty River Shannon

Author Paul Clements will retrace Richard Hayward’s 1939 exploration of the Shannon with original footage of the journey at a special event outside Nenagh this weekend as part of the Dromineer Nenagh Literary Festival.

Over 80 years ago writer, actor and singer, Hayward set out on his journey down the River Shannon for his bestselling book Where The River Shannon Flows, published in 1950.

Hayward (1892-1964), was born in Lancashire but grew up on the Antrim coast and loved Ireland. Noted for his travel books on the country, he explored the Shannon in August 1939, just two weeks before the outbreak of the second World War.

Hayward's book was reviewed by author of The Quiet Man, Maurice Walsh, in the Irish Times and was top of the paper's non-fiction list.

For his 2020 book Shannon Country: A River Journey Through Time, Paul Clements made his own journey down the Shannon retracing Hayward’s route from late spring 2017 to early summer 2018.

Paul has written: "My time-switching involved transporting myself back to the late 1930s to try to capture Hayward’s spirit and follow in his footsteps, tyre tracks and ripples."

Clements is the author of five travel books about Ireland. In 2014 his acclaimed biography of Hayward, Romancing Ireland, was published by Lilliput Press and adapted for BBC television.

His other books, for which he has travelled along the Irish coastline and over mountains and hills throughout the country, reflect cultural history, heritage, the natural world and stories from the people.

He is a contributing editor to Fodor’s Ireland and The Rough Guide to Ireland - for which he covers the Shannon region. He also writes a regular local history book review column and Irishman’s Diaries for the Irish Times.

This year he published a new biography of the travel writer and historian Jan Morris, Jan Morris: Life from Both Sides.

After his talk in the Muintir na Tíre Hall in Ballycommon on Sunday, October 2 at 10.30am he’ll be going on a cruise on Lough Derg where he’ll be joined on the Ku-Ee-Tu by award winning author, journalist and filmmaker John O’Connell for a conversation.

This will be a great chance to see the extraordinary beauty of Lough Derg. John’s debut memoir The Cow Book was a Number 1 bestseller and was the winner of the 2018 An Post non-fiction book award.

His most recent work bestselling work The Stream of Everything., his account of a two-day canoeing trip down the Camlin river in his native Longford was published in May of this year.

He is a columnist with the Irish Independent and lives and farms in Longford. 

To book a place at the talk and the cruise see www.dnlf.ie where you will find details of all the events at this year's festival.