Culture | Business Post

Appetite for Distraction

What to watch, listen to and play this week: A transgender story from the 1960s

A one-off documentary follows the life of April Ashley, a model and dancer who was one of the first British people to undergo gender reassignment surgery

Basic income for artists: ‘The idea is great, but the challenge is making sure it is going to the right people’

A pilot scheme to pay 2,000 Irish artists a weekly allowance has been broadly welcomed for the financial security it will afford those lucky enough to get it, but there are others who do feel it will not solve their problems

Book Review: Seven Steeples – Quiet, magical novel shows we are never truly alone in nature

Sara Baume’s chronicle of a couple living in not-so-splendid isolation in rural Ireland is rendered in hypnotising, inviting and reflective prose

Dick O’Riordan’s Classical Notes: The masks are off as Cork returns to choral glory

The Cork International Choral Festival will make a welcome return to the streets and stages of Cork city and county over the May bank holiday weekend

Oliver Callan interview: ‘I always find Leo Varadkar and Mary Lou McDonald are hilariously quite similar in that we don’t really know what their ideology is’

The political satirist on his culchie background, the various accidents and surprising twists of his career and how he managed to find more work by not looking for it

Nadine O’Regan: Forgive us our frivolities, we need some respite from real-world issues

Between Covid, a general feeling of unease and war, who can blame us if we take occasional refuge in celebrity weddings and Derry Girls?

Anton Savage: Don’t let Le Pen and Putin ride high on anti-EU rhetoric

It is time we stopped taking Europe for granted and acknowledged all the benefits it has brought us

One more tune: How Ireland’s nightclubs are fighting for survival

Where once we could dance the night away, offices, hotels and apartment blocks are springing up. But can Ireland’s nightclubs and late-night venues make a comeback and have they been given a lifeline by proposed new licensing laws?

Books: Never So Close, a poem by Dermot Bolger

Never So Close is from Dermot Bolger’s new collection, Other People’s Lives, published by New Island on April 7 at €12.99. For more details, see: newisland.ie/poetry-drama/other-peoples-lives

Taste Maker: Hugh Wallace, architect – ‘White paint is an opt-out. People need to challenge their creativity and I don’t think white paint does that’

The award-winning architect on the teacher who encouraged him, the best Scotch broth and learning to be patient

From one life to another: The Ukrainians finding their feet in a new land

Irish businesses and organisations working to support refugees are drawing on the expertise of new arrivals

Kathryn Thomas interview: ‘It’s important to ‘work, rest and play’, but resting is just as important as the other two

The TV presenter has lost none of the energy that propelled her to TV fame in her early 20s

Rachael English and Zara King: ‘There’s a responsibility in what we do, giving people a voice and an opportunity to tell their stories’

It’s been called the ‘first draft’ of history, but is journalism in the modern age still a desirable or even viable career? Seasoned journalists and broadcasters Rachael English and Zara King offer their take

Online dating for the over-50s: You hear horror stories – d**k pics, lies and scams – but my impression was that Irish men are basically decent and just looking for a human connection

Mid-life break-ups are on the increase and many people might be thinking about dipping their toe back in the dating pool, but with most relationships now being initiated online, Estelle Birdy looks at how to go about it

What to watch and listen to this week: Hugh Wallace returns with a new series of The Great House Revival

The well-known architect runs the rule over a Victorian house in Cork, while consumer journalist Conor Pope takes a look at the ongoing cost of living crisis in The Price of Everything

Book review: Red Carpet – How Hollywood gambled big on not upsetting China

A new book lays bare the complex picture of the US film industry’s relationship with the Asian superpower

Salvatore Fullam: ‘Art just haemorrhages money. I haven't managed to work out how you’re supposed to make a living from it’

The proudly Lucan-born and based artist had his first solo show two years after graduating from art college, was last year’s winner of the Zurich Portrait Prize exhibition and is preparing for an exhibition at the Kevin Kavanagh Gallery

Wedding woes: how getting married just got a lot more expensive

With inflation running at new highs and hotels trying to recoup Covid losses, many couples are finding that their big day has some new and unwelcome costs

Book review: Spanish novelist Elena Medel’s The Wonders brings poetry to a cross-generational tale of women’s lives

Medel doesn’t waste a single word in the telling of the story of grandmother and granddaughter María and Alicia, decades apart, as they navigate work, friendship, independence and love

Kathleen MacMahon: The attack on Ukraine shows that time marches on, but human nature doesn’t change

Some of us thought the arc of the moral universe was only bending in one direction. But we were wrong