Sprung 2009 - Writers & Guests

Writers & Guests at the 21008 Sprung Writers Festival, Albany, Western Australia, September 19-21

Hugh Mackay is a social commentator and a regular columnist for The West Australian and other newspapers. His most recent book on social issues, Advance Australia Where, presents a comprehensive overview of contemporary Australian society and poses pertinent questions about our nation’s future. Hugh is also a published author of fiction, with four novels to his name.

Tobsha Learner generated some lively discussion in 1997 with the publication of Quiver, a book of erotic tales. Is it porn or is it art? Tobsha’s work goes far beyond Quiver, however. Her works include plays and short films, and her latest novel Soul presents parallel stories from the 19th and 21st centuries raising questions about genetic determinism and free will, particularly in relation to violent behaviour.

Elizabeth Honey is an award-winning author of poetry, picture books and novels. Elizabeth is also an artist and illustrates her own books. Her picture books include The Moon in the Man and Not a Nibble. Her novels are published in many countries and include 45 + 47 Stella Street and Everything That Happened, Don’t Pat the Wombat, Remote Man, The Ballad of Cauldron Bay and To the Boy in Berlin, a collaboration with German author Heike Brandt. Her forthcoming picture book, I’m Still Awake, Still, is a collaboration with composer Sue Johnson, and includes a CD with eight beautiful new lullabies.

Amanda Curtin is a writer and book editor whose short fiction has won local, national and international awards. Her first novel, The Sinkings, involves mother–child relationships and intersex (conditions in which reproductive organs and/or sex chromosomes are not definitively male or female, or genitalia are misleading or ambiguous). At the heart of the novel, which merges past and present, is an actual murder that took place at a lonely campsite called the Sinkings, near Albany, in 1882

Chris Pash, former editor, correspondent, bureau chief and news company chief executive, was a reporter at the Albany Advertiser in 1977 when activists launched Greenpeace’s first direct action in Australia, aimed at ending whaling at Albany’s Cheynes Beach Whaling Company. His creative nonfiction book The Last Whale looks inside the heads of Australia's last whalers and those who tried to stop them. The story is written from the perspective of someone who has followed the lives of the key characters for thirty years. The Last Whale, published by Fremantle Press, will be launched nationally at Sprung 2008.

Dennis Haskell was born in Sydney but has lived in Perth since 1984. He is the author of 5 collections of poetry, including All the Time in the World, published by Salt in 2006, and 12 volumes of literary scholarship and criticism. All the Time in the World won the Western Australian Premier’s Prize for Poetry in 2007. Haskell has been Co-editor of the Australia’s second oldest literary magazine, Westerly, since 1985 and is Professor of English and Cultural Studies at The University of Western Australia. He is currently preparing a New and Selected Poems for publication by Salt in 2009.

Barbara Temperton is a Western Australian poet and is well known to Albany audiences. She is the author of Going Feral (WA Premier’s Book Award for Poetry 2002) and "The Snow Queen Takes Lunch in the Station Café" from Shorelines (FACP, 1995). Fremantle Press will publish Barbara’s third book, The Lighthouse keeper’s wife, and other stories, in 2009. Barbara’s work is amongst those honoured in the new South Perth Poetry Park.

Maree Dawes is an Albany poet who has studied writing at Murdoch and UWA (Albany Centre). Last year Maree had her short story I am so sweet and truthful and once I was betrayed published in Indigo and subsequently The Best Australian Stories 2007. Maree has been working on links between art and poetry for several years, including women in Picasso’s art, and three joint projects with artist Beth Kirkland. Maree’s first poetry collection which explores the lives of mistresses in Picasso’s life will be published this year and launched at Sprung.

Alvin Pang is a poet, writer and editor based in Singapore. His publications include Testing the Silence (Ethos Books 1997) and City of Rain (Ethos Books 2003), and several anthologies, including No Other City: The Ethos Anthology of Urban Poetry (Ethos Books 2000) and Love Gathers All (Ethos/Anvil 2002). His work has been featured in major festivals, publications and performances around the world. A Fellow of the University of Iowa International Writing Program (2002), he was named National Arts Council Young Artist of the Year (Literature) in 2005, and awarded the Singapore Youth Award (Arts and Culture) in 2007. He is co-editor, along with John Kinsella, of the new anthology, OVER THERE: Poems from Singapore and Australia (Ethos Books 2008).

Vivienne Glance is a poet, playwright, theatre director, actor and short story writer.Her poetry and short stories have been published in journals (online and print) and in anthologies, plus she’s won prizes and commendations in competitions and written poems to accompany several art and photography exhibitions. Vivienne enjoys performing her poetry at readings and slams, and regularly reads the English translations of the work of Sudanese-Australian poet, Afeif Ismail. She recently won the WA State Final and placed third in the National Final of the 2007 Poetry Slam. She took part in the 2008 PIAF Writers’ Festival and in March performed at the Sydney Opera House Studio as part of Night Words Spoken Word Festival. Vivienne runs workshops in performance poetry and playwrighting.
As a playwright, her full length and short plays have been performed in Edinburgh, London, Sydney and Perth. As an actor Vivienne recently appeared on stage in The Ships Pass Quietly by John Aitken, earning her a nomination for Best Actress in the Perth Theatre Trust/ Equity Guild Awards in 2007.

Trisha Kotai-Ewers loves words, playing with them all her life as linguist, teacher and now as writer. She has had poetry and prose published in books and journals. Her first book, Listen to the Talk of Us: People with dementia speak out, based on her work as Writer in Residence for people with dementia, was published by Alzheimer’s Australia (WA) in 2007. For the last 20 years Trisha has been active within the FAWWA.

Eric Hayward comes from the Goreng and Kaneang Noongar groups whose traditional country stretches across the Great Southern and Southwest areas of Western Australia. He was born in the Gnowangerup Mission in 1945 and concluded his education in Perth while living in an Aboriginal hostel run by the Native Welfare Department. He has a long history of leadership in his community. No Free Kicks, published in 2006 by Fremantle Arts Centre Press, is Eric’s first book. In it, he tells the compelling stories of his parents and grandparents, of growing up in a large Noongar family, and the importance of Australian Rules Football in their lives. Eric describes writing the book as telling his story, not only for himself, but for the benefit of his community.

Dianne Wolfer is author of 11 YA and children’s books. Lighthouse Girl, set on Breaksea Island will be released in March 2009. Dianne loves living in the Great Southern and is the West Australian Advisor for the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators. More info is available at www.diannewolfer.com

Warren Flynn is the author of five novels, which are loved by high school students throughout Australia. His books have been short listed in WAYBRA. Different Voices was also shortlisted for the WA Premier’s Prize. Warren has a Masters in Creative Writing and recently completed a PhD in English. He tutors at UWA, Albany.

Geoff Waldeck is a local musician who is very involved in the local and regional music industry organising and coordinating numerous song writing workshops and concerts. He has played in four local bands over recent years, and at present he performs as a soloist, and also in the band “The Oafs”. Geoff was a co-winner of the inaugural national Fresh-air song-writing competition in 2003/4. He has supported such Australian artists as Paul Kelly, Darryl Braithwaite, Ian Moss, Tex Perkins, The Waifs and John Butler Trio. Geoff aims to create and produce quality original music and to assist and encourage the development of original music and musicians in Albany.

Jon Doust is a self made man, which accounts for his flaws and peccadilloes but fails to answer the big question: Why does he fail to recognise, to perceive, to acknowledge his overuse of tautology. He has co-authored three children’s books with Ken Spillman, two of them currently in bookshops and the last struggling to find its end. The big news is he has an adult book due out in the middle of next year, Boy on a Wire, a book he swears by, stands by and stresses "Is not based on any life, or any living person and, besides, all the names have been changed". He makes a living, which is more than can be said for a lot of people who think they run the country

Glenn Swift, storyteller extraordinaire, was voted Sexiest Man in Albany in a competition held at Cheynes Beach holiday camp in 1998 but was left right off the Albany Advertiser 'Significantly Socially Aware' list for that year. The impact was such that he has spent the last ten years looking for the meaning of life , usually in the more affluent countries of Western Europe, and always in Summer time. Prior to Sprung this year he has been studying traditional Russian drinking poetry in Yaroslavl, dancing at every opportunity and making stuff.