What do we allow into our hearts and heads? - "fluttering their way / into my head... / plum blossoms" - The great haiku master Issa wrote over 20,000 haiku, little masterpieces of kindness, wonderful caring observations of the natural world around him. Birds, frogs, butterflies, fleas, insects, snow, all entered his heart and head from season to season: - "The small crow / is snubbed / geese in the rice field" - There's fun to be found here and excitement- in the littlest things. Open your heart and open your head to the incredible world of haiku.

As with its European neighbours, Ireland is home to a number of festivals which celebrate the art of travel writing, the annual Lismore Festival of Travel Writing in County Waterford for example. The modern genre of travel writing as practiced by Irish writers is very different to much of what passed for travel writing in Ireland, until very recently. In the colonial context that defined Irish history and culture prior to the last century, travel writing was frequently viewed an adjunct to the all-knowing imperial gaze. It was an element in that tradition which sought to know, to define and...