When she heard we were going to Ireland, my next door neighbour suggested we find a walking tour of pubs with poetry readings.

In her case the poet rambled through a poem called ‘Mad Cow and Me‘, and it was one of the highlights of her time in Ireland.

I never found a poetry tour but did locate a literary pub crawl, which contained a poetry reading or two, and a ton of half-lit pub atmosphere.

We started in The Duke Dublin where we met the two actors/tour guides who performed a selection from James Joyce’s The Ulysses in an upstairs room.
The taps at The Duke include some excellent craft beer so you don’t have to order a Guinness if you’re not inclined.
Although being surrounded by all the literary brilliance was making me wonder, is there something in the Guinness? Or might it be the whiskey? And isn’t there a song about that?
A selection from Waiting for Godot was performed standing underneath this cathedral, followed by another pub and another pint.
Davy Byrnes, where many literary characters met and drank and presumably wrote brilliant things.
M.J. O’Neill, our next literary pub.
 The two characters who performed this selection of Irish literary masterpieces.
Before I went to Ireland I borrowed a James Joyce from the library. It was a bit of a slog, and when I admitted this to my Irish seat mate on the plane she exclaimed, “Oh dear, no one ever actually reads Joyce, they just quote from his books!”

I heard this quote of Joyce’s on our literary pub tour, where the literature came in palatable doses and could be washed down with a pint of beer…

“…and yes
I said yes
I will yes.”

A quote from James Joyce’s Ulysses along with some graffiti in the Temple Bar District.

All Dublin’s Literary Pub Tours start in The Duke Dublin at 7:00. Below is a map containing some of the pubs we went to on. There are at least 20 literary pubs in Dublin, and each night the tour goes to a different selection of pubs, led by two of the six actors who switch around roles, so that each pub crawl is often different from the another.

• More of Daily Post’s Weekly Photo Challenge: Half-light.
• More on our 2015 trip to Ireland.