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UCD alum Ferdia Lennon wins 2025 Rooney Prize for Irish Literature.
Ferdia Lennon has been announced as the recipient of the 2025 Rooney Prize for Irish Literature. Lennon is a graduate of UCD, holding a BA in History and Classics from the University. His debut novel, Glorious Exploits, was published in 2024, and was a Sunday Times bestseller.
The Rooney Prize for Irish Literature has been awarded annually since 1976, and is aimed at recognising an outstanding body of work by Irish writers under the age of forty. The prize is valued at €10,000.
The Rooney Prize is administered by the Trinity Oscar Wilde Centre for Creative Writing in the School of English, Trinity College Dublin.
Previous winners of the award include fellow UCD graduates, Neil Jordan, Ronan Sheehan, Frank McGuinness, Paul Mercier, Gerard Fanning, Philip Ó Ceallaigh, Kevin Power, Colin Barret, and Niamh Campbell.
Anne Enright, Professor of Creative Writing at the UCD School of English, Drama and Film, is also among the previous recipients of the award.
Responding to the news of the award, Ferdia Lennon said: "So many of the previous winners of the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature are writers whose work has inspired and moved me throughout my own writing life. To be recognised by the same award is both a wonderful and deeply affirming experience.
"I'm profoundly grateful to Peter Rooney and the Rooney family for their generosity, and to the judges for the care and attention they brought to reading my work. We Irish writers are fortunate to have, in our literature, such a rich imaginative ground to return to; and to be acknowledged among the ranks of such a remarkable body of work here at home is a joy and an honour I’ll carry with me."