PAUL O’REILLY lives with his wife and children in Co. Wexford, Ireland.
Fiction
Longlisted for the 2015 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award and the 2016 Edge Hill Short Story Prize, Paul’s debut short story collection The Girl Missing from the Window was published to critical acclaim by Doire Press. RTÉ Ten said, “this striking collection is often topical, yet it transcends topicality with style and mastery”.
In 2018, Paul was awarded an Arts Council of Ireland English Literature Bursary and in 2019 was awarded a coveted mentorship (with Ferdia Mac Anna) as part of the Words Ireland National Mentoring Programme. In 2021, he was runner-up at the Irish Writers Centre Novel Fair.
In 2024, Paul completed the selective Curtis Brown Creative Six-Month Novel Writing Course.
Paul’s stories have been shortlisted for the Hennessy First Fiction Award, the Seán O’Faoláin Prize, the Bristol Prize and twice for the William Trevor/Elizabeth Bowen International Prize. His work has been published in the Irish Independent, the Irish Times, The Stinging Fly, The Scaldy Detail, Natural Bridge (US), the Bristol Prize Anthology (UK), Ireland’s Own, online at NecessaryFiction.com (US), Writing.ie, TheJournal.ie and selected for The Lonely Voice series of readings at the Irish Writers’ Centre. In 2012 he was nominated by Natural Bridge (US) for a Pushcart Prize and in 2013 he received an honourable mention from Glimmertrain Press (US).
Stage
In 2015, Paul was commissioned by Enniscorthy Drama Group to write a full-length stage play to be performed as part of the Co. Wexford Centenary Celebrations of the Enniscorthy 1916 Rising. Entitled A Night on the Hill, the premiere performances took place May 5th-8th 2016 in the historic Athenaeum Theatre – the HQ of the Rising in 1916 – in Paul’s home town of Enniscorthy. There were also matinee performances for local schools due to the historical significance of the play’s content and setting.
In 2020, Paul’s second full-length stage play, Wild in the Country, was premiered by Enniscorthy Drama Group to acclaim with audiences responding with: “A homegrown gem”; “Hilarious!”; “Miss it at your peril”; “A quirky, dark comedy worth catching”; “We had a fantastic time tonight”; “A funny and fabulous new play”; “This is the best play I’ve seen in a long time”.
In 2023, Paul had two plays produced. Rattlesnakes was a one-act written in conjunction with a Creative Acting for Theatre course, utilising improvisation with the actors to help develop characters, and was facilitated by Fintan Kelly.
Later that year, Paul’s debut one-man play MASK was professionally produced to acclaim by Enniscorthy Theatre Company. “In ‘Mask’, an original one-man play and the brainchild of Enniscorthy scribe, Paul O’Reilly, Buster the Clown takes centre stage, goes it alone, and single-handedly brings the house down. This is a clown that you can’t help but love, though he has a tragic back story so expertly relayed by actor, Fintan Kelly, that it will remain pecking at your mind long after the theatre hall empties. In fact, it will follow you home. Fans of ‘Mask’ writer O’Reilly’s work will be familiar with the short story collection ‘The Girl Missing From the Window’ (Doire Press) and will know that he doesn’t shy away from creating characters with disturbing flaws. It adds to his masterful storytelling, and he delivers endings that don’t disappoint.“
In 2024, Paul wrote and starred in his second Creative Acting for Theatre course play, produced by ETC on the All-Ireland One-Act Circuit, entitled Going Home.
Screen
In 2012, his film script adaptation of the Claire Keegan short story Men and Women won the FilmOffaly/Filmbase Award and the completed film, directed by Ruth Meehan, produced by Ink and Light, was selected for the 2013 Galway Film Fleadh and Irish Film Festival London. In 2014 the film was shown on national TV as part of the RTÉ 2 Shortscreen series. “Paul is an exciting writing talent who seems to have effortlessly crossed over from exquisite short-story writing to screenwriting. Of course it’s not effortless at all, but Paul has a quiet, unassuming way of being the hardest working, most prolific guy in the room. He is a fantastic collaborator and a joy to work with.“
In 2013, he wrote, produced and directed the documentary film Paddy Berry: The Singer, the Song and the Place to wide acclaim, excerpts broadcast on RTÉ. “A really beautiful, considered and expressive film that goes a long way to showing what a wonderful man Paddy Berry is and how magical the songs and lore are of which he is not only a conduit, but a champion.“
Later that year, he produced and performed in the short monologue film Wobble, based on his story published in the Irish Times as part of a flash fiction series, with a revised version appearing in the Cáca Milis Cabaret anthology, Red Lamp Black Piano, introduced by Pat McCabe.
In 2014, he wrote, produced and directed his next documentary, Eamonn Wall: Your Rivers Have Trained You, later selected in the same year for the IndieCork Film Festival and the St Louis International Film Festival. “An engaging and thought-provoking film. Through Eamonn Wall’s poetry and the images Paul O’Reilly has brought together so skillfully, I feel we’re not only informed and gratified, but also encouraged to think about the relationship of our own origins and early experiences to the selves we grow to become, about the ways our literal physical homes speak with our imagined interiorized homes, about the ways we carry our earliest selves and our earliest homes with us wherever we go. I think it’s just a smashing film.“
Paul has completed several Film and TV screenwriting courses, masterclasses and workshops with Eilish Kent, Mary Kate O’Flanagan, Jimmy McGovern and Screen Training Ireland.
Other Interests
A Fleadh winning Irish traditional singer, songwriter, lilter, and musician, Paul has produced and recorded on several albums, while also appearing on national radio, TV, with the Irish Chamber Orchestra, and was a prominent member of The 1916 Song Project national concert tour. Paul is a registered member of IMRO and the Arts Council of Ireland, from whom he received a Deis award in 2008 for his acclaimed double album The Poet’s Dream. “This collection is produced to the very highest of standards. The way in which a tradition of balladeering that extends over five generations has been presented as a coherent whole on the album is very impressive. While The Poet’s Dream is mainly about the human voice, putting previously unreleased songs on record, it also serves to underline the versatility of Paul O’Reilly as an instrumentalist.“
From 2006 to 2024, Paul was core architect with the award-winning software company Structure101. In 2012 their product Restructure101 won the Most Innovative Java Technology Award at the JAX Innovation Awards. Working in the cyber-world for such a flexible and innovative company was instrumental in the development of his productions and writing during that period.
Paul enjoys walking, swimming, has run one marathon and dreams of another. He has mentored, managed and coached extensively at nursery, underage and developmental levels in the GAA.
In psychotherapy, Paul has studied several modules of the Human Givens approach.
Paul O'Reilly 