Author Marguerite Penrose in conversation with Noelle Brown reflects about her life, work and inspiration in her memoir ‘Yeah, But Where Are You Really From’ – an open and thought provoking read which explores Marguerite’s life and her thoughts and experience of; needs of people born in institutions, on being a Black Irishwoman and about living with a disability.

Marguerite Penrose was born in St Patrick’s Mother and Baby Home on Dublin’s Navan Road in 1974 and grew up in Dublin. In recent years she has been writing and speaking publicly about the needs of people born in institutions, about being a Black Irish woman and about living with a disability. She works for the VHI and lives in Meath.

Noelle Brown has been an actor since 1987 and became a playwright and theatre-maker in 2013. As an actor, she has worked extensively in theatre, film, television and radio. Drawing on her own experiences of being an adoptee, she co-wrote her first play Postscript with Michèle Forbes.

Postscript, in which Noelle performs, toured all over Ireland, played at the Centre Cultural Irlandais Paris, at the Abbey Theatre, and the London Irish Centre. It was nominated for the Fishamble New Writing Award and the Bewley’s Little Gem Award at the Dublin Fringe Festival.

Foxy, her play about prejudice towards Irish Travellers, premiered at Project Arts Centre Dublin. Creaking, a play about older people toured Ireland as part of the Bealtaine Festival. Her play Spit, commissioned by Here for Now Theatre company, recently premiered in Stratford Ontario. In 2018, she became a stand-up comedian, gigging all over Ireland and at the London Irish Centre. Recent theatre work includes being Lead Artist and Curator on the Abbey Theatres Home: Part One and playing Nancy in Absent the Wrong by Dylan Coburn Gray as part of Dublin Fringe Festival. Noelle is also a campaigner for Adoption Rights in Ireland.

http://noellebrown.com/

Kildare Readers Festival is brought to you every year in October by Kildare County Library and Arts Service. For more information about KRF see https://kildarecoco.ie/library/KildareReadersFestival/