Next year the Olympics is taking place in Rio, as you are no doubt aware. Are you looking forward to the event? Should you be?

A full house of 30,000 will watch Galway play Dublin in Boston in Super 11 hurling. It provides a platform to present hurling to larger audiences, writes Donal Óg Cusack from Boston.

London-based Niall O’Flaherty, 44, is lead singer with the Sultans of Ping. The Cork band will play at the Jerry Fish Electric Sideshow at the Electric Picnic this weekend.

Billy Collins brings a brilliant eye to the most mundane events, writes Alan O’Riordan

Devotees of the traditional championship structure probably woke today with a thumping headache.

Brian O’Driscoll has brought high emotion to Lansdowne Road over the past 14 years and we can expect more of the same today

Canada

Ah, the late, late rethink. Bane of the columnist’s life. Last week yours truly had a tasty segment of his column nicely tucked away, simmering like a stew just beginning to brown as the flavours seep through.

The late John Updike’s essays on Joan Miro and other artists are collected in Always Looking, Carl Dixon reports

Ah, the joys of Christmas.

The most notable match report of a quiet footballing week should have been the account of Alex Ferguson’s visit to the Harvard Business School.

Where Have You Been?

Higher Gossip

AMERICAN author David Guterson has joined John Updike, Tom Wolfe, Norman Mailer and other literary stars as the recipient of the dreaded Bad Sex in Fiction award.

AMERICAN author David Guterson has joined John Updike, Tom Wolfe, Norman Mailer and other literary stars as the recipient of the dreaded Bad Sex in Fiction award.

Piers Morgan and his wife Celia Walden have welcomed a baby girl into the world.

JOHN BUTLER’S main work has been in film and TV. In 2006 he moved to Los Angeles, and started writing a blog.

JP O’Malley speaks to one of the most prolific writers of the last 50 years about her latest work, an honest account of becoming a widow ... and marrying again.

AHAB and Nemesis.

THIS is going to be about a hurling man – but let’s start with some baseball.

THE great American novelist John Updike, though not a sportswriter, did at times indulge his nation’s favourite pasttime. And when he did, he hit a home run.

My Father’s Tears and other Stories

IT’S Masters Sunday — Tiger is in the hunt for another green jacket, Harrington is quietly coming up on the rails and Mickelson is mounting a fightback.

IT’S BEEN a tough week for the greats. John Updike passed away a few days ago at the age of 76.

ZIMBABWE: President Robert Mugabe’s party said yesterday it is prepared to form a government on its own if the opposition won’t join it — a move certain to anger the West.

John Updike, the Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, prolific man of letters and erudite chronicler of sex, divorce and other adventures in the post-war prime of the American empire, died today. He was 76.

The 18 contenders for the inaugural Man Booker International Prize were announced today.

George Plimpton, the self-deprecating American author of Paper Lion and a patron to Philip Roth, Jack Kerouac and countless other writers, has died, aged 76.

More than 120 books have been nominated for the IR£79,000 annual IMPAC Dublin International Literary Award.