The Wheeler Centre

One of Ireland’s most celebrated writers appears for one night only to reflect on his extraordinary career and discuss his latest novel, Long Island.

In 2009, Colm Tóibín published Brooklyn – a ‘beautifully executed novel’ (The Times Literary Supplement) that followed Eilis Lacey as she left Ireland for New York in search of a more fulfilling life.

Now, the three-time Booker Prize-shortlisted author returns to his beloved heroine in Long Island. Eilis, now in her forties, is married with children and living in a cul-de-sac surrounded by her husband’s family – seemingly settled into the American middle-class dream. But when an unexpected knock at the door shatters this illusion, everything changes.

Presented by The Wheeler Centre and Melbourne Writers Festival, Tóibín joins host Jason Steger for an expansive conversation about his distinguished career and this latest deeply moving addition to his oeuvre – a story permeated with the themes of exile, belonging, desire and regret that have come to define his remarkable body of writing.