Hot Press writer Jackie Hayden will deliver a talk to Limerick City Library, on Thursday, April 18, about how he discovered the poetry of Dylan Thomas through Bob Dylan and The Beatles. Hayden's talk will be part of Limerick's April Is Poetry Month.

Entitled Dylan, Dylan and Me, Hayden has already given his talk to various venues around Ireland and Wales, including the RDS in Dublin and Dylan Thomas’s birth home in Swansea.  The talk is scheduled for 7.30 p.m. and admission is free.

Hayden came to the poems of Dylan Thomas through his interest in Bob Dylan, who had allegedly expressed his own admiration of Dylan Thomas by adopting the Welsh poet’s name, and through The Beatles on whom both Dylans were a big influence, especially on John Lennon. During his talk, he will reflect on the connections he sees between Thomas’ poetry and Bob Dylan’s lyrics in the wake of Bob's Nobel Prize for Literature.

Hayden is the author of several books, including Love and Theft? Bob Dylan’s Celtic Odyssey and A Map of Love - Around Wales with Dylan Thomas, as well as the best-selling My Boy about Irish rocker Phil Lynott.