Seamus Heaney: Historic Bellaghy Bawn to become a writers' centre

A historic building in Seamus Heaney's home village is to become a hub for writers through funding from the Irish government.

The development of Bellaghy Bawn is to receive €4.6m (£4m) from the Shared Island Fund.

The Irish government said the money would create "a cross-border residential facility for writers to work and interact".

The Bawn is a short distance from the Seamus Heaney visitor and arts centre.

The Homeplace opened in the village in 2016.

The Nobel laureate's family donated a number of his books and belongings to the centre.

Bellaghy Bawn was originally built as a fortified house in the early 17th century on lands granted to the Vintners Company of London as part of the plantation of Londonderry.

It was destroyed, along with some of the rest of the village, in the rebellion of 1641 but soon rebuilt.

In the 18th and 19th centuries a medical dispensary operated from the Bawn.

In an interview with The Irish Times when Bellaghy Bawn opened as a museum in 1996, Heaney said it was a special place and had inspired his famous poem Digging.

He told the paper the idea for the poem had come to him late one night coming home from a dance as he was changing gear at the bend in the road beside the Bawn.

"In that very second, as I experienced a change of gear in my body, my mind was snatching at the idea of poetry as a change in my own way of life," he said.

A sculpture by David Annand called The Turf Man, in reference to Digging, was unveiled outside the Bawn in 2009.

However the museum was, more recently, only open on Sundays.

The new writer's centre at Bellaghy Bawn will be similar to the Tyrone Guthrie Centre at Annaghmakerrig in County Monaghan.

Like the Tyrone Guthrie Centre, it will be a residential centre where writers can stay, work and meet.

The final design and business case for Bellaghy Bawn will be jointly worked on by the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media in the Republic of Ireland, in co-operation with the Department for Communities (DfC) and Mid-Ulster District Council.

There is no confirmed date for the opening of the new centre.

In a statement to BBC News NI, Mid Ulster Council said an outline business case was being being finalised and would be submitted to the DfC for approval shortly.

"There are no other publicly-funded writer's residencies in Northern Ireland," the council said.

They added that the council was working with the Tyrone Guthrie Centre.

"Bellaghy Bawn Writers Residency has the potential to be a driver and enabler of equality, inclusion, innovation and social and economic change for both the village of Bellaghy and across the island," the spokesperson added.

"The project will create opportunities for writers to grow and move forward and for Bellaghy to be recognised as a creative hub for the arts."

The Tyrone Guthrie Centre is also receiving about €1.5m (£1.3m) from the Shared Ireland Fund for a new visual artists studio.

The Irish Architectural Archive, the Irish Traditional Music Archive and the Irish Film Institute will also receive funding for cross-border projects.