Publications

Of all the people I thought I might grow up to be, a lesbian wasn’t one of them. I never fantasized about women or imagined loving them. I didn’t have crushes on women or crave their attention.

For most of my adult life, I have been, in the words of Beyoncé, a single lady. I met my current partner in 2021. My previous relationship ended in 2009. For the intervening 12 years, I was single.

When I hit puberty, I stopped eating. My body was changing. The place I’d called home for more than a decade started to become rounder and more womanly. I hated it. All I wanted to do was hide.

Six stories to challenge your assumptions about one of the world’s most iconic cuisines

The State's long-awaited scheme to fund fertility treatment is finally in place, but it leaves same-sex couples out in the cold, say campaigners.

The Government’s first step toward making fertility treatment more accessible shouldn’t be to exclude people in gay relationships.

The decision whether or not to have a child is one of the most consequential choices most people make. As I edge past my mid-thirties, it’s a question that has dominated my thinking. When faced with a dilemma I can’t solve, my usual strategy is to read.

Reading Ciara Mangan’s powerful testimony about the workplace harassment she endured after being raped was eerily familiar to me. I have lost count of the number of times I’ve been in offices where people say appalling things about survivors of sexual violence.

June is Pride Month. For the queer community, it’s a time of celebration, visibility and protest.

As the number of fatalities on Irish roads hits a 10-year high, one woman reflects on her mother’s death.

I spoke with Claire Byrne about road safety and my mother’s death.

“Gathering over food is the cornerstone of our relationship. I never feel closer to her than when I sit opposite her at our tiny fold out table and say “Amore mio, how was your day?”

Eight stories to complicate your clichéd idea of Ireland.

Six stories to change the way you think about nature.

Clare Egan applauds In The Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado and how it started an important conversation about queer domestic violence.

On the anniversary of the death of Ashling Murphy, writer Clare Egan says if we really want to end male violence, we must listen to survivors.

One of my favourite sub-genres of queer literature is novels or memoirs written by poets. These books combine a poet’s masterful command of language with a narrative that extends beyond the bounds of poetry’s tight form.

Every evening, my mother set a big silver kettle on the range to warm. With it, she filled a hot water bottle for each child’s bed.

“It's easy to believe that we are a modern, progressive society. It's easy to believe but it's not true.”

Alcohol is a drug. Dress it up how you will, it is still a mood-altering, cell-killing, depressive, addictive drug.

I am one of the many thousands of students to pull up to an Irish university, deposit their money and walk away with what is – essentially – an empty qualification.

As part of the Simon Cumbers Media Fund, Clare Egan travels to visit Malawi’s prisons.