Writer Feature: Aine Collins
The Writer's Notebook
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The Writer's Notebook *
Aine Collins is from Ireland. She is one of IHRAM Press’s treasured writers. In this interview, she shares her musings, inspiration, and honest thoughts on her experience with us as an author and activist.
Her latest publication with IHRAM Press is featured in IHRAM Quarter 2 Literary Magazine: Reflections of Feminine Empowerment.
Thank you for all you do, Aine.
Now be honest, how has your experience been with IHRAM Press? How did you find us and why did you choose to publish with us?
It was an amazing experience to be featured as IHRAM is a platform which gives a voice to artists and issues around the world.
Would you recommend IHRAM Press to other writers/artists?
Absolutely! IHRAM are passionate about creativity and about artists creating social change.
Share a quote from your poem published in IHRAM Literary Magazine 2024!
“I also see, a foot away from her amid the rubble, the bright tags of designer jeans.
The only thing intact, gleaming in the sunshine like a new pin. In-destructible and un-repentant. Endless paperwork detailing orders, design and manufacturing requirements. The only survivors fluttering amid the devastation like a murderer who leaves the scene of a crime.”
Now for the fun questions! What compels you to pick up a pen or open your laptop to free-write? And what inspires/influences your writing, particularly when it comes to addressing human rights issues?
I am passionate about human rights and I was inspired to write my story, “Killer Jeans” after reading about a garment factory collapse in Bangladesh and the tragic deaths that occurred there. I imagined a character facing work in those conditions and tried to re-create a story where a female character is forced to work in a building that was structurally un-safe.
The human rights concerns addressed in the IHRAM literary magazine are often complex and challenging to navigate. How do you navigate the balance between highlighting these challenges and maintaining a sense of hope or optimism in your writing?
I believe that by highlighting human rights abuses in our world, artists and writers have a unique place and role to play in bringing about change. We can create characters that allow people to feel empathy and challenge them to consider how it might feel to walk in another person’s shoes and to experience the injustices they face.
How do you personally connect with our mission? Particularly on the power of art and literature to influence social change, and our values of beauty as a fundamental creative principle, sincerity, vulnerability, celebrating diversity, and opening doorways of engagement.
I think that it is a noble mission and a very necessary one in today's world. Social media has made us so much more aware of what is going on in every corner of our world and I feel that artists must shine a light on the shadows that still exist in our world. Artists are by nature sensitive and as poet Ezra Pound says, “The artist is the antenna of the race.” Society needs artists and writers to save us from apathy when others are suffering.
The IHRAM magazine aims to celebrate authors contending with their identities within the context of their environments. How does your environment influence your view of the world (your home country, city, and surrounding culture)?
I am an Irish writer and so I am inspired by a rich tradition of Irish writers and poets including W.B. Yeats, Oscar Wilde, Seamus Heaney and Patrick Kavanagh.
In comparison, how does your intersectionality influence your view of the world (your personal beliefs, gender expression, religious affiliations, etc.)?
I have a unique voice as a female Catholic writer and Poet.
