{"id":445,"date":"2012-05-27T21:59:11","date_gmt":"2012-05-27T11:59:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/misrule.com.au\/wordpress\/?p=445"},"modified":"2012-05-27T21:59:11","modified_gmt":"2012-05-27T11:59:11","slug":"writers-writers-everywhere","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/misrule.com.au\/wordpress\/writers-writers-everywhere\/","title":{"rendered":"Writers, writers everywhere…"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yup, it’s (been) that time of year again\u2014Sydney Writers’ Festival<\/a> and the many and varied events that go along with it. It’s a busy time of year for me\u2014made slightly less so by the fact that the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards<\/a> dinner didn’t happen this year, and also by the fact that I piked on the opening night party, which I remain sad about (I could possibly have embarrassed myself by gushing all over Jeanette Winterson<\/a> if I had<\/em> gone) but sometimes you just need to stay home and hunker down with the kitties<\/a>.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, it was made a madder time for me by the fact that the Children’s Book Council<\/a> somewhat bizarrely decided to hold its bi-annual (that’s every two years, right?) conference on exactly the same weekend as SWF. And so, sensibly, my friends at the Centre for Youth Literature<\/a> in Melbourne decided to hold a round table discussion about literature programming for young people on the eve of the CBC Conference. And so although I wasn’t able to go to Adelaide for the CBC, because of my commitments to SWF, I did go make a flying overnight 24 hour turnaround visit to attend the CYL roundtable.<\/p>\n

Have you had enough acronyms yet?<\/p>\n

So yeah, crazy busy. But well worth it.<\/p>\n

And these things do have a way of working themselves out. Take for example the fact that I am usually committed to MCing the SWF School Days<\/a> in Parramatta and Penrith in the week leading up to the main Festival, which in the usual way of things would have meant that I could not have gone to the CYL Round Table. However, as the obnoxious and pretty well worse than useless NAPLAN<\/a> tests were held in that week, the schools’ days were pushed out until the week after the Festival, so I could do all of the above. You follow? What a schedule.<\/p>\n

So, this is what my Sydney Writers’ festival looked like: I didn’t see a single panel\/session I wasn’t involved<\/a> in. Bummer. However, I did attend the western Sydney final of The Rumble<\/a>\u2014the youth poetry slam that The Day Job<\/a> was involved in, and our awesome kids\u00a0 from Rooty Hill HS<\/a> won both the team and solo prizes. Go Nicole and FourPlay!<\/p>\n

From there I dashed over to The Wharf for a panel on writing in western Sydney, of which, the less said the better. (If you were there, you’ll know why. If you weren’t, buy me a beer and I’ll tell you about it.)<\/p>\n

Sunday was my crazy day, as always, with three back-to-back sessions. The first two were easy enough, in that I was introducing writers\u2014my lovely friends from the UK, Mal Peet <\/a>and Elspeth Graham<\/a>, and then the inimitable John Flanagan<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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The third I was what they call a participating chair, with my dear friend Margo Lanagan<\/a> and Mette Jakobsen<\/a>, whose first novel, The Vanishing Act<\/em><\/a>, is a marvel and if you haven’t read it, then get to it. This panel was called Islands of the Imagination, as both The Vanishing Act<\/em> and Margo’s latest novel\u00a0 Sea Hearts<\/em><\/a>, are set on islands, and share a number of tropes and themes (absent mothers<\/a>, grief and loss, mourning children, abandoned husbands…) It’s always hard to tell how a panel that you’re chairing is going\u2014I felt a bit rusty on this one, to be completely honest, but people seemed to like it, and M and M had kind words to say, so hopefully it was OK.<\/p>\n

The schools days, though, are a breeze and a pleasure. I’m sure they’re not a breeze to organise\u2014So Many Logistics!\u2014but as MC, it’s a case of Know Thy Authors and have fun with the audience. I MC the secondary and primary days at Parramatta Riverside Theatres<\/a>, and the primary school day at the Joan Sutherland Performing Arts Centre<\/a> in Penrith. It’s not just a fun gig, it’s a good opportunity to promote The Day Job and to talk to teachers in the breaks\u2014I’ve got one potentially very exciting program to discuss with a librarian from one of the high schools in the south-western region of Sydney once I get back to my desk next week. This week. Tomorrow.<\/p>\n

What a cast of characters! Three lovely women\u2014and me!<\/p>\n

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L-R: Lucy Christopher<\/a>, me, Jane (JC) Burke<\/a> and Vikki Wakefield<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Two lovely men\u2014and me!<\/p>\n

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Me in a Mal Peet (l) and Eoin Colfer<\/a> (r) sandwich.<\/p>\n

Two Olivers!<\/p>\n

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Jeffers<\/a> (l) and Phommavanh<\/a> (r).<\/p>\n

And I didn’t get photos, but there was also the lovely Tristan Bancks<\/a> and Emily Rodda<\/a>. (Is there a plural for lovely?)<\/p>\n

So that all happened, and then Bam! We were lucky enough to have the wonderful Swiss-Italian writer Davide Cali<\/a> (here for the CBC conference) in Sydney, so of course, lunch was required:<\/p>\n

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Here Davide is signing a copy of his book Ten Little Insects<\/em><\/a> (a riff, in graphic novel form, on Agatha Christie<\/a>‘s And Then There Were None<\/em><\/a> [aka Ten Little Indians<\/em>]) for Susanne Gervay<\/a>. Davide is also a cartoonist, and he adds a little extra to every signed book. Looking on are Susanne, Wayne Harris<\/a>, Julie Vivas<\/a> and Donna Rawlins<\/a>. Also at the lunch, but not in the photo, were Davide’s Australian publisher Andrew Wilkins<\/a> and Ursula Dubosarsky<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So, you know, INSANE, but wow, what a lovely way to go mad. Writers, writers (and illustrators!) everywhere\u2014and I wouldn’t have it any other way.<\/p>\n

OK, maybe with more sleep…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yup, it’s (been) that time of year again\u2014Sydney Writers’ Festival and the many and varied events that go along with it. It’s a busy time of year for me\u2014made slightly less so by the fact that the NSW Premier’s Literary … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-445","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-misrule"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/misrule.com.au\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/misrule.com.au\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/misrule.com.au\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/misrule.com.au\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/misrule.com.au\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=445"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"http:\/\/misrule.com.au\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/445\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":464,"href":"http:\/\/misrule.com.au\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/445\/revisions\/464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/misrule.com.au\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/misrule.com.au\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/misrule.com.au\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}