Hey gang. Are you cool?
Be cool.
Only got about a quarter of the response to this month’s haiku comp – doh! The them was ‘the richness of the internet’. Thinking I might have to do it only every two months, or perhaps the topic was hard? Nonetheless, there were a few good’uns. The winner is Chris Grist, via Twitter (he’s @chris_974), with
Shrimp on a treadmill
Running to Benny Hill Theme
I heart Internet
Chris wins two books of his choice from the list I will promptly email him. Runner-up, who chose to write a little ode to the addictive richness of the internet, was commenter carolynian, with
firewalled on work terminal
i make love to facebook
via mobile phone
She wins one book of her choice from the list. I’ll be in touch guys, congrats!
The piccie is Sisyphus, a von Stuck interpretation. The internet has borrowable art, yay.
* I haven’t had a chance yet to link to all the Sydney Writers Fest stuff my attention has been drawn to, so here goes:
Tara Moss’ ‘Postmortem on a Festival’ (her festival blog was witty and informative, great work)
Christine Bongers’ ‘Postcard from Sydney Writers Festival’
Richard Flanagan’s fantastic closing address
Jabberwocky‘s ‘Letter from Sydney (Writers Festival)’ (which acts as a great round-up on its own)
Croakey‘s ‘Some Moments, irritating and sublime, from the Sydney Writers Festival’
The SWF website now has a bunch of videos, audio and other highlights up
* And here are some other folks’ round-ups, reviews and experiences of the Emerging Writers’ Festival:
3000 Books was all over the EWF and gives us her thoughts
Liz Argall brings us ‘5am Melbourne – After the Emerging Writers’ Festival’
Lisette Ogg gives Speakeasy her view of the festival
Paul Callaghan also has all-nice things to say
Graham Clements also attended, and gives us some very detailed commentary
* For constant round-uppy stuff, check out the Australian Literature twine.
* Have been slowly finding out who will be attending Ubud Writers and Readers Festival in Bali in October, where I’ll be moderating a panel. The latest news is Wole Soyinka. Check out his impressive wiki entry. This festival attracts some seriously prestigious talent, yet within a very intimate, humbling atmosphere. I can’t wait to see what I’ll learn this year.
* OMG. You know I’m a big fan of Philipp Meyer (and also my Dad, Phillip Meyer), but anyhoo, I was bummed to miss his event at Readings due to EWF duties. But YAY, there’s a podcast. Enjoy. Then buy American Rust from them.
* So, the ASA got 268 applications for their mentorship program this year. I was not one of the 20 recipients, but good on them!
* Publisher Black Inc. has a really great blog, the Inc. Blot. Good mix of the professional, industry insights etc., book info and personalised posts.
* Zoetrope’s virtual studio was mentioned by Steven Amsterdam at EWF as being a great online creative writing workshopping-space; and Rijn Collins mentioned RedBubble.
* First Melbourne Writers Festival authors announced.
* New issue of The Short Review is up, featuring reviews of Nam Le’s The Boat, Josephine Rowe’s East of Here, Close to Water and Ali Smith’s The First Person and Other Stories (I want). There’s also a great interview with Josephine.
* ‘On June 3, 1964, T S Eliot sent a car to London’s Savoy Hotel to bring Mr and Mrs Groucho Marx to dinner.’ From Eric Hanson’s A Book of Ages. I believe the Aus/NZ rights to this book are available…
* This new biography of Arthur Miller sounds rather interesting. I’m a fan of his work, and some of you know I’m a huge Marilyn Monroe fan. Their marriage fascinates me. The Misfits has got to be one of the saddest movies around, and I love it. Miller wrote the role for Marilyn, and she gets to generally be raw and vulnerable in it, almost uncomfortably so. But their complex marriage deteriorated on set, which makes it even sadder. I always loved reading about Marilyn’s friendship with Monty Clift during the filming – ‘misfits’ in their own right, staying up late drinking whisky together. Has anyone read, or seen the play After the Fall? I wonder how I’d feel about it.
* Have I mentioned Meanjin‘s blog, Spike yet? I’m seriously enjoying it. A real range of topics by super-intelligent, funny and broad-minded contributors. Their new issue is out now too.
* A directory of book trade people on Twitter, mainly US/UK.
* This week I went to one of the Independent Type Thursday night events, at the State Library of Vic, and let me tell you – $5! An absolute bargain. It was called Word Juggling: Poetry & Performance. I was expecting the usual line-up of (wonderful) performance poets, and suddenly I was bopping away to hip-hop from Tjimba and the Yung Warriors (so rad, check them out), and hearing a D&M with Josephine Rowe and Myron Lysenko – poets of completely different generations discussing the changes in the Melbourne scene. It was MCd by Steve Grimwade. SRSLY, get along to one of these bargain evenings. You can buy wine too, and the library actually serves really decent stuff.
