On the 15th of October, Eoin's brother Brian (together with honorary Murray and long time best friend, Jonathon Finn) ran the Palma Marathon to raise funds for the scholarship.

Brian started running four months ago (!) and decided that he would complete a marathon, before his 30th birthday, in memory of Eoin and in support of the scholarship.

Brian and Jonathon had a team of supporters in his parents; Jim and Tess, his sister; Maria and Jonathon's parents; John and Roseleen. 

In total, Brian managed to raise over €2000.  Words can't really express how humbled and grateful we all are for all the support and interest to date.  It's overwhelming, both the donations and the emails and letters we have been receiving in support of the scholarship.  We feel this is an opportunity to create something positive out of a terrible tragedy.  Nothing can really ease the loss of Eoin being here, gifting the world with his work.  However this scholarship is something he would have been proud of, and in the lack of Eoin's poetic voice in the world, we can support others. 

Thank you again for all of your support, well wishes and love.  

Colette Sheridan from The Evening Echo contacted us via the site to ask for information on an article about Eoin, the scholarship and the marathon that Brian is running to raise funds.  The article came out this October 10th and it was a heart-warming thing to see and read.  Colette chose beautiful photographs of Eoin and printed one of his poems - The Stream - with the article. 

The interview is mostly with Brian, and he has some great anecdotes and insights into Eoin's personality.  Some of my favourite quotes are....

"He was an amazing guy. I feel lucky more than anything to have had time with him. I’ll never again have the kind of conversations I had with him. He was amazingly artistic and very clever. He had been in local bands, playing drums and bass. He also played the piano and a bit of ukulele and he acted in plays."

“I’ll always remember one particular weekend. On Friday night, he was doing a gig in Cork. On Saturday night, he was playing in Belfast and on Sunday night, he was in Kerry doing a play as Gaeilge. He was about 18 at the time.” 

"(Eoin) would literally read and write all the time. It wasn’t him saying ‘I’m going to be a writer’. He was really doing it. He would tell people he was sorry he couldn’t meet them as he had books to read."

Click here to read the full article online.