I’m excited to be invited back to one of my favourite festivals, Perth Writers Festival, which runs from 20-23 Feb. I’m appearing in one event, chairing two others, and teaching a workshop on flash fiction. Hope to see some of you there?
More details on my sessions:
Sat 22 Feb
10 am
Grand Allusions (free, Romeo tent)
When the fictional heroes and heroines of novels are writers themselves, centuries of literary allusion and reference can creep into a text. How important is literary allusion in the novel and what is its purpose? Rabih Alameddine and Margaret Drabble speak with Angela Meyer.
(I’m so excited about this one, wonderful writers and a nerdy, literary topic. Yes!)
4 pm
Hi-Vis Daze (free, Romeo tent)
In order to make ends meet, comedian Xavier Toby needed a real job. So he began a second life as a FIFO worker in a remote Queensland mine, writing down his hilarious experiences along the way. He dishes the dirt to Angela Meyer.
(I just gave this book a wee review on Goodreads.)
Sun 23 Feb
1 pm
Small and Perfectly Formed (free, Woolnough Lecture Theatre)
Julienne van Loon, Ron Elliott and Angela Meyer have turned to the novella, short story and flash fiction for their new books. They discuss the attraction of short fiction and its place in publishing today with Annabel Smith.
(I get to talk about my own fiction, as well as the stories in The Great Unknown, awesome.)
2 pm (I’ll have to run to this!)
Workshop: Flash Fiction ($53 to $67.50, Alexander Lecture Theatre)
Very short stories have been around a long time: even Kafka, Woolf and Hemingway wrote them. Angela Meyer introduces you to the form. Embrace brevity and experiment with notions of character, conflict and resolution, and evocation of place and mood, in few words.
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I’m looking forward to catching some events as well: Lionel Shriver, Richard Flanagan, Eleanor Catton, Antony Loewenstein, Martin Amis… as many as I can manage. Off to do some reading…
Well, seeing as you’re wandering back to Perth, don’t be too amazed if I bob up at some point and say ‘hi.’ Are you back in Australia yet?
That’s fantastic that you get to chair an event with Margaret Drabble. I only read the edges of your review of ‘The Waterfall’ (I can’t bring myself to even read flyleafs before I’ve finished the book) but I really want to find a copy of it and read it.
See you there, Glen! And yes, back in Aus, spending a bit of time with my folks before heading back to Melbourne. Are you doing any work with the fest this year?
Not sure yet. After three years on the front line, it might be time for me to go back to being a civilian. But I may still persuade myself to take up the cudgels and don the orange shirt once more. (God, makes me sound like I’m from Ulster…)
http://whisperinggums.com/2014/01/17/margaret-rose-stringer-and-then-like-my-dreams-review/
I would love to have been asked to this year’s Festival (see link for reason why).
What a wonderful review of your book! Congratulations. I recently wrote an article for Newswrite on writers’ festivals. My main tip would probably be for you/your publisher to get in touch very early, like 6-7 months before a festival. Reviews like this probably will help as well!
Ha! My publishers made no attempt to enter for this year. And it was they who forwarded the review on to me. I’m on me pat, and that’s a fact,