James O'Sullivan (writer)

James Christopher O'Sullivan (born 1986) is an Irish writer, publisher, and academic from Cork city.^[1] He is the founding editor of New Binary Press and the author of two collections of poetry.

Career

Academia

O'Sullivan is involved in the study of Digital Humanities, and has a partcular interest in computer-assisted text analysis and new media studies.^[2][3] He has held faculty positions at various institutions around the world, including Pennsylvania State University and the University of Sheffield.^[4][5][6] O'Sullivan is Chair of the Digital Humanities Summer Institute Colloquium at the University of Victoria.^[7] In 2014, he was shortlisted for the Fortier Prize for Digital Humanities research.^[8]

Publishing

In 2012, O'Sullivan founded New Binary Press,^[9] a publishing house dedicated to the publication of both print and electronic literature. New Binary Press has published a number of established authors, including Nick Montfort, Stephanie Strickland, and Karl Parkinson. The venture has had a lot of critical success; Graham Allen's The One That Got Away was shortlisted for the Shine/Strong Award 2015,^[10] while Unexplained Fevers by Jeannine Hall Gailey came second in the 2014 Science Fiction Poetry Association's Elgin Award.^[11]

Writing

O'Sullivan's first collection of poetry, Kneeling on the Redwood Floor, was released by Lapwing Publications in 2011,^[12] a work which the author himself did not rate very highly.^{[13][14][15][16]} In 2014, Alba Publishing released his second collection, Groundwork. In 2016, O'Sullivan was placed third in the Gregory O'Donoghue International Poetry Prize.^[17] He has also been shortlisted for Fish Poetry Prize in both 2015 and 2016, as well as the Fish Short Story Prize 2014/15. He received a High Commendation in Munster Literature Centre Fool for Poetry 2014 International Chapbook Competition and 2013 Charles Macklin Poetry Prize.

O'Sullivan writes for the Evening Echo, a regional newspaper in Cork.^[18][19] He has worked particularly closely with Feis Maitiú Corcaigh, a major cultural festival, as their resident journalist.

Personal

O'Sullivan was born and raised in Cork city, Ireland.^[20] O'Sullivan has often expressed great affection for his home town.^[21][22][23] He is the grandson of a locally-famed performer, Billa O'Connell.^[24][25][26] O'Sullivan attended Coláiste an Spioraid Naoimh, where he took the Irish Leaving Certificate Examinations.^[27] O'Sullivan did not enjoy his time at school.^[28] He is a graduate of Cork Institute of Technology, University College Cork, and University College Dublin.^{[29][30][31][32]}

In 2016, O'Sullivan was very vocal in his support for the beleaguered Cork Film Festival.^[33][34]

Bibliography

Poetry Collections

• Groundwork, Uxbridge: Alba Publishing (2014), ISBN 978-1-910185-03-2.
• Kneeling on the Redwood Floor, Belfast: Lapwing Publications (2011), ISBN 978-1-907276-84-2.

References