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Writing Life

Information, inspiration and insights into the writing life.

Diane Bell Wins The 2023 Hazel Rowley Literary Fellowship

On Wednesday 8 March, in front of a large audience at Adelaide Writers Week, writer and anthropologist Diane Bell was announced as winner of the 2023 Hazel Rowley Literary Fellowship. Diane was awarded $20,000 for her proposed biography of the relationship between Ngarrindjeri woman Louisa Karpany, née Kontinyeri (c1840–1921) and George Mason (1811–1876), sub-Protector of …

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New National Cultural Policy

Writers Centres welcome $19.3 million for Writers Australia in new National Cultural Policy The National Writers Centre Network (NWCN) has welcomed the Albanese Government’s National Cultural Policy, Revive, launched in Melbourne on Monday 30 January by Arts Minister Tony Burke. The Policy includes the creation of a new body called Writers Australia located within the …

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Kate Mildenhall on The First Time podcast, first words and celebrating the wins with your wingpeople

Kate Mildenhall is the author of Skylarking (Black Inc., 2016) and The Mother Fault (Simon & Schuster, 2020). She co-hosts The First Time podcast, a podcast about the first time you publish a book, now in its fifth season. Kate lives in Hurstbridge on Wurundjeri lands, with her partner and two children. She is currently working on her third …

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2023 Hazel Rowley Literary Fellowship shortlist announced

Nine Australian writers have been shortlisted for the 2023 Hazel Rowley Literary Fellowship, worth $20,000. ‘This year we are very pleased to see proposals from every state and territory, reflecting the diverse range of approaches to writing biography and memoir in Australia today,’ said Della Rowley, sister of biographer Hazel Rowley. ‘The quality and calibre …

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Sian Prior on Life Writing’s Curious Temporality

Dr Sian Prior has been a writer and broadcaster for 30 years. She has been published in newspapers, magazines and literary journals. Sian teaches non-fiction at RMIT and runs online courses in creative non-fiction and writing as therapy. She has written two books, Shy: A Memoir (2014) and Childless: A Story of Freedom and Longing (short-listed for The Age Non-Fiction Book of …

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Writing the Body

(…) my much inscribedskin knows a space behind the word where you become real. Miriam Tag, “and mystery exists“, from “abstract alphabet“, translated by Jo Langdon There is a mystery in how language appears. This here, right now. A poem, prose, a piece of writing. Sometimes words are just there, all around; they keep creeping, …

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An introduction to the 2023 Season 1 Program

As an introduction to our 2023 program of events, Writers Victoria’s Program and Partnerships Manager, Anna Kate Blair, writes below about our 2023 theme: FLOW. I know many writers, myself included, who love water, love writing about it. It makes sense, to me: words operate like liquid. They can pool in the wrong places, stagnate, …

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The 2022 Deborah Cass Prize Shortlist

The Deborah Cass Prize committee and Writers Victoria are pleased to announce that eleven writers have been shortlisted for the eighth and final Deborah Cass Prize. The prize is focused on development of unpublished writers who have either migrated to Australia or have a parent who migrated here. The winner receives a cash prize of …

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Round 8 Neilma Sidney Literary Travel Fund Recipients

Since 2017, the Neilma Sidney Literary Travel fund has provided access to professional development for emerging, mid-career and established Australian writers and literary sector workers. On behalf of the Myer Foundation, this Round’s judges, and Writers Victoria, we are thrilled to announce the Round 8 Travel Fund recipients. The judges for this round were poet, …

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Anna Spargo-Ryan on Memory and Memoir

Anna Spargo-Ryan is the award-winning author of A Kind of Magic, The Gulf and The Paper House, and a winner of the Horne Prize. Her work has appeared in The Big Issue, Island, Kill Your Darlings, Meanjin, Good Weekend, the Guardian, and many other places. She is a PhD candidate in Creative Writing at Deakin University, …

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