OzAsia Fest & Open State present Writing China curated by the wonderful team of Nicholas Jose and Sam Prior where I was thrilled to be invited to facilitate two events: Growing up Asian in Australia and Reimagining. Growing up Asian in Australia featured the wonderful team behind Pencilled In - founding editor - Yen-Rong Wong, art editor Rachel Ang and the very real & irreverent (as opposed to the fictional!) Julie Koh. The panel grappled with conversations about writing and working as writers and artists ten years on from the publication of Growing up Asian in Australia. 10 years from when Alice Pung was advised by an industry person that her “heavy introduction” which detailed the invasion and dispossession of Australia’s Indigenous peoples, the White Australia policy, including information about the racist violence towards the Chinese during the 1850s and 60s, would scare away Border bookshop customers. Reimagining featured acclaimed experimental fiction writer Dorothy Tse, Hugo award winning author Jingfang Hao (who beat Stephen King to the award for her work Folding Beijing) and 2017 Sydney Morning Herald Best Young Australian Novelist Julie Koh. This panel traversed topics such as writing contemporary fiction - what it means to write satirical, experimental or sci-fi works; how form and content informed each author's fictional worlds. It was thrilling to be part of a panel featuring authors of Asian descent, and to be able to frame our conversation based on their writing and work. In an interview with the Director of the SOMA project’s Hong Kong Atlas initiative, a project which aims to support the translation and publication of Hong Kong literature, Dorothy Tse said that “for Chinese, Hong Kong or mainland writers, we face the problem that when the West see us the first thing is that of our identity as an Asian writer, Chinese writer or Hong Kong writer, where we have to tell a story about place”. My reading of this is that there is a consumption of narratives by white Western readers wanting to gain insight and translation into another person’s culture, where writing becomes an Ethnic-town tour. However, as Dorothy Tse asserts that to really gain insight into another culture, readers can’t just read the realistic stories, but also need to read stories through their form.
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This inaugural women's poetry night is coordinated by local poet Manisha Anjali (who is also a fellow Wheeler Centre Hot Desk fellow alumni) at second hand bookshop Grub Street in Fitzroy. Manisha's debut poetry collection Sugar Kane Woman is one of my favourite poetry collections.
Excited & honoured to launch Margaret River Press' Joiner Bay & other stories, edited by Ellen van Neerven. Looking forward to hearing Else Fitzgerald read “Sheen”, Miriam Zolin read “Better Than the Farm” and Gail Chrisfield read “Still Life with Dying Swan” at Readings in Melbourne.
Margaret River Press has published the launch speech on their website. It’s the job of the writer to ensnare their audience and embed their reader within the worlds they create. How do writers locate their reader in places, environments and contexts, and how does this affect a reader’s commitment to the work?
This event draws together artists working across diverse genres and themes, and plays with the form of the traditional reading by inviting the audience to curate their own pathway through a series of concurrent literary performances. Real and imagined, contemporary and historic, near and far – choose your own adventure, and explore how you can be transported by the writing and performances of different artists. With: Adolfo Aranjuez, Mark Brandi, Lian Low, Magan Magan, Jennifer Porter, Vidya Rajan, Angela Serrano, Mia Wotherspoon. Hosted by Soreti Kadir. Thursday 22 June, 2017, 6pm - Free! See EWF's Literary Live Art , at VU Metrowest for more details Thursday 22 June, 2017, 6pmThursday 22 June, 2017, 6pm A sneak peek of my piece at EWF's Literary Live Art , VU Metrowest on Thus 22nd June When I craved love, I would look to the heavens, hoping to catch a glimpse of paradise in the sky Stars twinkling like fireflies Melbourne’s overripe moon glowing an outer space gold I looked, onwards and upwards For that invisible road to Heaven’s Doors Hoping the Doors would burst open to show my destiny Little did I know that Paradise lay at Footscray’s riverbank. Grounded along the banks of the Maribyrnong, Oblivious to industry, machinery and heavy traffic Glimpsed by thousands as they sped across train tracks The sixteen metre Heavenly Queen’s gaze is serene as she looks past black swans, cormorants, swamp hens, red-rumped parrots, marbled geckos and Pobblebonk frogs. Her gaze drifts towards Footscray Road, floating past the Yarra, until her wide- open eyes contemplates the Bass Strait. Patron of seafarers, demon destroyer, rainmaker and healer. In her fingers, a small ball of light, Beacon to shore. (My guide to the animals in the Maribyrnong River Estuary via Melbourne's Living Museum of the West - http://www.livingmuseum.org.au/home/ ) |