RTÉ SHORT STORY COMPETITION 2025: SHORTLIST ANNOUNCED
RTÉ SHORT STORY COMPETITION 2025: SHORTLIST ANNOUNCED
WINNERS TO BE ANNOUNCED AS PART OF AN RTÉ RADIO 1 ARENA SPECIAL ON FRIDAY 24TH OCTOBER
LIVE FROM THE PAVILION THEATRE, DUN LAOGHAIRE AND ON RTÉ RADIO 1 FROM 7PM
“The Arena team have been wonderful partners of this series over the years, culminating in the annual Arena/RTÉ Short Story live awards night in the Pavilion Theatre, and Seán Rocks was absolutely central to that, always handling proceedings with his customary warmth, humour, intelligence and grace” – Sarah Binchy, Producer
DETAILS: www.rte.ie/writing
TICKETS: https://www.paviliontheatre.ie/events/view/arenalive
FOLLOW: #rteshortstory
RTÉ has announced details of the ten exciting new stories which have been shortlisted for the RTÉ Short Story Competition 2025 in honour of Francis MacManus, from 2,200 entries submitted.
The ten shortlisted short stories were selected by this year’s judges, writers Neil Hegarty, Tristan Rosenstock and Jan Carson (pictured).
New judge, Jan Carson has described this year’s shortlist as “eclectic, captivating and a real snapshot of the issues pertinent in contemporary Ireland”. See what all three judges said about this year’s stories in the Notes to Editors below.
The shortlisted stories, in alphabetical order by story title are:
- A Spectrum of Sorrow, by Angela Finn
- Auntie and Anto and Ivy and Ava, by Ian Feighery
- Corrán na Maidine (Irish language), by Niall Ó Siadhail
- Feeding Time, by Sinèad Troy
- It Must Have Come First, by Sage Omar
- Kazakhstan, by Kevin McDermott
- Labels, by Mary O’Rourke
- Pool Story, by Jill Kenny
- Witness, by Lynda McCarthy
- Wolves, by Peter McCauley
***Information about the writers and their stories are included in the Notes to Editors below, along with the RTÉ Radio 1 broadcast schedule.
All ten stories will be published on rte.ie/culture on Saturday 11th and Sunday 12th October, and broadcast (read by actors) over the course of the following two weeks, from Monday 13th October on RTÉ Radio 1’s Late Date (See broadcast schedule in Notes to Editors). They’ll also be featured regularly on RTÉ Radio 1’s Arena in advance of the awards event – an RTÉ Radio 1 Arena special programme live on RTÉ Radio 1 from the Pavilion Theatre in Dún Laoghaire, Co. Dublin, at 7pm on Friday 24th October, which all the shortlisted writers are invited to attend. The event will feature readings of extracts from all ten shortlisted stories, each followed by a discussion with all three judges before they award their top prizes.
The winning writer will receive €5,000, while the second and third placed writers will receive €4,000 and €3,000 respectively. All seven runners-up will receive €300 each.
Tickets for that event are now on sale here.
Sarah Binchy, series producer said: “After a bumper year for entries, I’m delighted with this year’s vibrant shortlist, and looking forward very much to sharing the stories with our listeners, as voiced by our talented actors. I’d also like to acknowledge the sad recent loss of our RTÉ Radio 1 colleague, Arena presenter Seán Rocks. The Arena team have been wonderful partners of this series over the years, culminating in the annual Arena/RTÉ Short Story live awards night in the Pavilion Theatre, and Seán was absolutely central to that, always handling proceedings with his customary warmth, humour, intelligence and grace. We will seek to honour him by continuing this tradition in partnership with the brilliant Arena team, and with our fine judges this year: Neil Hegarty, Jan Carson and Tristan Rosenstock.”
Set up in 1986 to honour writer and broadcaster Francis MacManus, the RTÉ Short Story Competition has been a critically important launch pad for new and emerging writers in Ireland. Past winners and shortlisted writers include Claire Keegan, Molly McCloskey, Danielle McLaughlin, Anthony Glavin, Chris Binchy, Nuala O’Connor, Liz Nugent, Colin Walsh, Stephen Walsh, Austin Duffy and Sarah Gilmartin.
The RTÉ Short Story Competition is free to enter, and open to any writer over 18 living on the island of Ireland or living abroad who holds an Irish passport. For more on the RTÉ Short Story Competition, see www.rte.ie/writing.
ENDS
For information:
Neil O’Gorman, Corporate Communications Manager, RTÉ | E: neil.ogorman@rte.ie
NOTES TO EDITORS
WHAT THE JUDGES SAID:
JAN CARSON (new to the judging panel)
“We had a wonderful time reading, discussing and selecting the ten stories which made the shortlist for this year’s RTÉ Francis McManus Short Story Prize. The writing was notably strong and engaging with a wide-ranging variety of themes explored though it was interesting to see some re-occurring themes emerging. These included aging, experiences of mental health issues, coercive control and, of course, the family. The judging process was really enjoyable with all three judges coming to harmonious agreement on the stories which should make the shortlist. The shortlist we decided upon is eclectic, captivating and a real snapshot of the issues pertinent in contemporary Ireland. We’re so looking forward to hearing these stories brought to life by a range of talented actors and seeing how the listening public responds.”
TRISTAN ROSENSTOCK (new to the judging panel)
“Judging this year’s competition was an absolute pleasure and allowed me the opportunity to enjoy a cornucopia of new Irish writing. The ten shortlisted stories represent the breadth of voices, along with the extraordinarily high standard of writing that was there in abundance in this year’s crop. Many other stories could have easily made it on this year’s shortlist, such was the quality of storytelling. Caring for family members, rocky relationships and coping with grief are among the themes that were so eloquently explored by our shortlisted writers. They all richly deserve to be read – and heard – over the coming weeks. Enjoy!”
NEIL HEGARTY (returning to the judging panel)
“It was a great pleasure to judge this year’s RTÉ Short Story Competition. I was struck once more by the sense that this competition assesses the mood of the country, that it has the finger on the pulse of what is moving through our thoughts in Ireland, of what is being discussed between friends and within families. Health and ageing, grief and the possibilities for happiness, children’s issues, our ongoing transformation into a multicultural society, women’s stories in all their variety and complexity, masculinity and the different forms it can take – all of these themes, and so many more, register in the stories this year. What a privilege to read them – and my thanks to my fellow judges Jan Carson and Tristan Rosenstock, and to competition editor Sarah Binchy.”
ABOUT THE JUDGES
JAN CARSON
Jan Carson is a writer based in Belfast. She is the 2025 Seamus Heaney Centre Fellow at Queen’s University and a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Author of three novels and three short story collections, she won the EU Prize for Literature for Ireland for her novel The Fire Starters. Her work has been published in numerous journals and broadcast on RTÉ Radio 1 and BBC Radio 3 and 4. Her next novel, Few and Far Between, is forthcoming from Doubleday in 2026.
NEIL HEGARTY
Neil Hegarty’s novels include The Jewel and Inch Levels, shortlisted for the Kerry Group Novel of the Year award. Neil’s non-fiction titles include the biography Frost: That Was the Life That Was; and The Story of Ireland, which accompanies the RTÉ-BBC television history of Ireland. His short fiction and essays have appeared in the Dublin Review, Stinging Fly, Tangerine, and elsewhere and he is co-editor of the essay collection Impermanence. He is a regular literary reviewer in the Irish Times.
TRISTAN ROSENSTOCK
Tristan Rosenstock is a broadcaster with RTÉ Raidío na Gaeltachta, where he presents the arts series An Cúinne Dána. His debut Irish-language book for young readers Inis Mara was selected for World Book Day 2024, and Inis Mara 2 was recently published by Leabhair COMHAR. He is co-editor of Inside Innti – A new wave in Irish Poetry (Cork University Press) and is literary editor of the magazine Comhar. He sits on the boards of Irish Writers Centre and Poetry Ireland.
ABOUT THE WRITERS AND STORIES (Alphabetical order by writer’s first name)
ANGELA FINN (‘A Spectrum of Sorrow’)
Angela Finn, from Dublin, is a final year PhD student at the School of English, Dublin City University, with a particular interest in hybrid literary forms. She won the 2020 Madrid Desperate Literature Short Story competition and was the 2022 recipient of the Iron Mountain Literature John McGahern Award.
About the story
‘A Spectrum of Sorrow’ started life as a prose poem, exploring the complexity of grief and how one copes, (or doesn’t) in its aftermath. The character’s voice emerged during redrafts and took the narrative to its natural conclusion.
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IAN FEIGHERY (‘Auntie and Anto and Ivy and Ava‘)
Ian Feighery is from Templeogue, Dublin, where he now lives with his husband. He works as a primary school teacher in Tallaght and holds an MA in Children’s and Young Adult Literature from DCU. Ian writes with the PiCWiTs, a creative writing group of practising and retired teachers in Drumcondra Education Centre. This is his first published story.
About the story
Overwhelmed by guilt and unnoticed by the grown-ups in her life, a young girl tries to make amends for a past wrongdoing… I wanted to convey the inner turmoil of a child that so often goes unnoticed by the adults in their lives, and how relationships with these adults can have a transformative effect on their understanding of the world.
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JILL KENNY (‘Pool Story’)
Jill Kenny B.A English Lit UCD, M.Sc Multimedia DCU has been published in Arc Literary Magazine, Future Perfect anthology, and exhibited in the RHA. She’s been placed in national poetry competitions and was guest poet at Prima Vista Literary Festival. Jill is working on her first book with support from The IWC’s National Mentoring Programme, The Source, and The Stinging Fly Summer School. She’s inspired by the ancient oak wood and farm she grew up on in Tipperary, long-term meditation, and modalities that explore inner and outer systems.
About the story
I’m really interested in human potential. Whether it’s in small brave gestures or life work, and how that’s influenced by the spaces we’re in. Pool Story is born from that.
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KEVIN MCDERMOTT (‘Kazakhstan’)
Kevin Mc Dermott is a Wicklow-based writer. He has written six YA novels. His stories and poems have been published in journals in Ireland, the UK and the US. He is a Fulbright/Creative Ireland Professional Fellowship awardee and holds an MFA in Creative Writing from UCD.
About the story
In ‘Kazakhstan’, a son’s Kazakh girlfriend brings new life and the wonders of the night sky into the world of a grieving husband. The birth of our first grandchild in March was certainly an inspiration. The ongoing war in Ukraine is there in the background, as is Robert Lepage’s beautiful play, The Far Side of the Moon.
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LYNDA McCARTHY (‘Witness’)
Lynda McCarthy is originally from Cork and now lives in Waterford with her husband and children. She is an award-winning journalist and is currently working on a Middle Grade mystery novel. This is her first time putting a piece of fiction forward for publication.
About the story:
I wanted to explore this character who feels barely visible in her own home – what would it take for her to change her circumstances? What would it mean for her to have someone witness how she is treated?
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MARY O’ROURKE (‘Labels’)
A single 68-year-old retired library assistant, Mary O’Rourke lives in Galway. A former member of Galway Writers’ Workshop, she particularly enjoys writing haiku, sestinas and poetry with spiritual themes. Other interests include singing, theology, abstract art and theatre.
About the story:
‘Labels’ explores the inner monologue of a person with a mental illness in a stream of consciousness style, told in a joco-serious manner, related in a single sentence but with a certain coherence.
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NIALL Ó SIADHAIL (‘Corrán na Maidine’)
Originally from Tyrone, Niall Ó Siadhail is an Irish language writer, translator and teacher based in Dublin. His story Beir an Solas leat won first prize at Oireachtas na Gaeilge in 2024. He is currently working on a collection of short stories, as well as his first novel, which is about a jazz musician in London.
About the story:
‘Corrán na Maidine’ was inspired by a placename in London, Mornington Crescent – in Irish the word for ‘crescent’ is also the word for ‘sickle’, and the image ‘the sickle of morning’ called out to me, suggested a fateful moment in someone’s life, clarity achieved in the cold light of day.
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PETER McCAULEY (‘Wolves’)
A Derry native, Peter McCauley graduated from the Open University in 2018 with a first-class honours degree in English Language and Literature. He works in a secondary school in Derry, but outside of this, he is working towards developing a creative writing career, and he plans on setting more stories, both for page and stage, in his native city.
About the story:
About the story: ‘Set in my native city of Derry, ‘Wolves’ is a story about family, home, isolation and mental fragility; a portrait of a lost boy, spiralling downwards. It is a warning about the fine lines that exist between sanity and madness, and the finer lines that separate males from animals.
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SAGE OMAR (‘It Must Have Come First’)
Biography
Sage is a writer from North London studying the MA in Creative Writing at Queen’s University Belfast. He writes short stories, flash fiction and poetry that often explores themes of identity and belonging. Currently, Sage is working on his first novella about a haunted council house and the blue Somali family who live there.
About the story
‘It Must Have Come First’ is a story about how we concoct the strangest of fictions to avoid facing reality. It’s a story about death and rebirth, about love, loss and loneliness, and, mainly, it’s a story about a gigantic egg that takes over a nameless character’s life.
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SINÈAD TROY (‘Feeding Time’)
Sinèad Troy is from Dublin and currently resides in Hell where she is rewriting the manuscript of her working novel. She was shortlisted for the PJ O’ Connor Radio Drama Awards in 2009 and again in 2019. She contributed a monologue to the “Dear Ireland” series that was performed in the Abbey Theatre in 2020.
About the story:
Feeding Time is about a politician whose candidacy for the next election is threatened by someone from his past. It explores the impact that our personal values can have on others, and the conflict between public perception and introspection.
RTÉ Radio 1 Broadcast Schedule (11.20pm)
Monday 13 October
Witness, by Lynda McCarthy, read by Eileen Walsh
Tuesday 14 October
It Must Have Come First, by Sage Omar, read by Marty Breen
Wednesday 15 October
Feeding Time, by Sinéad Troy, read by Andrew Bennett
Thursday 16 October
Wolves by Peter McCauley, read by Paul Mallon
Friday 17 October
Corrán Na Maidine, by Niall Ó Siadhail, read by Brídín Ní Mhaoldomhnaigh
***No story broadcast on Saturday 18 October
Sunday 19 October
Labels by Mary O’Rourke, read by Clare Barrett
Monday 20 October
Kazakhstan, by Kevin McDermott, read by John Olohan
Tuesday 21 October
A Spectrum of Sorrow, by Angela Finn, read by Janet Moran
Wednesday 22 October
Pool Story, by Jill Kenny, read by Naoise Dunbar
Thursday 23 October
Auntie and Anto and Ivy and Ava, by Ian Feighery, read by Ebby O’Toole Acheampong