Past Programs
Events and Festivals - 2008
National Poetry Slam
01/12/2008
Literary critic Harold Bloom called it the 'death of art' but to some poets, slamming has given poetry a new life. From its beginning in Chicago in the 1980s, this cabaret style word duel has spread around the world—including to Australia. Since June, performance poets from Broome to Dubbo have competed in slam heats and the finalists are converging on Thursday 4 December at the Sydney Opera House for the Australian Poetry Slam final.
Reading the art of Yinka Shonibare
24/11/2008
We're turning the page in search of the literary references in the work of British-born Nigerian artist Yinka Shonibare's black and white photography. His work is the focus of a new program at the Museum of Contemporary Art called 'Inspired Reading'.
The first session in the program examines the influence on Yinka's work of Oscar Wilde's 1891 novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, that gothic horror story about a man who remains forever young and beautiful, while his portrait ages and gets uglier as his acts of debauchery increase.
Anna Akhmatova -- poetry star of Russia
21/11/2008
In Russia, poets are like rock stars and during the Stalinist era purges they represented the voice of the people. This was a heavy burden. Many poets went into exile, but not Anna Akhmatova. She stayed, was denounced and kept writing as fellow poets were executed. Anna Akhmatova was born into Tsarist Russia in 1889. Her first book Evening was published before World War I. She lived through the October Revolution, the civil war, Stalin, the terror years, World War II and the relative thaw of Khrushchev. She died in 1966, a national hero.
A session celebrating her life and poetry was held at the Melbourne Writers Festival with historian of Russia, Orlando Figes in conversation with poet and theatre critic, Alison Crogon. The event is moderated by Ellen Koshland.
Novel simulations in Second Life
17/11/2008
There's the Charles Dickens theme park, book- inspired computer games and film adaptations of novels like Bladerunner, but to get an immersive experience of a book, some enthusiasts have recreated the settings of their favourite novels in Second Life, an online virtual world. A literary conference in Second Life called 'Stepping into Literature' featured these simulations and librarians, book lovers and academics attended.
Ian McEwan at the Sydney Opera House (repeat)
04/11/2008
Earlier this year novelist Ian McEwan was a guest at the Sydney Opera House in the International Speakers Series. In his humorous address he explores the boundary between fact and fiction, he talks about the engagement of readers with ideas and characters and he reads from some of the marvellously cranky letters he has received, correcting facts in his novels.
(First broadcast 11 April 2008)
Writing the Future: the first Asia-Pacific festival of writing
29/10/2008
Professor Rukmini Bhaya Nair, poet and editor of the Indian Literary journal Biblio, is one of the organisers of the first Asia-Pacific Festival of Writing, held this month in New Delhi and the Indian hill-station town of Shimla.
Financial doom and gloom and Frankfurt Book Fair antics
24/10/2008
We talk to writers all the time about their books, but have you thought about how they come to be published, or how international writers' books end up on our shores?
The process of getting books into print in different regions around the world has a lot to do with the wheeling and dealing that goes on at large international book fairs.
It is the 60th anniversary of the Frankfurt Book Fair, which just wrapped recently. Despite the international financial crisis, it's reported as being the biggest ever.
Book collecting
14/10/2008
If you enjoy walking through a bookstore, taking a book off the shelf, holding it in your hands, buying it and adding it to your collection at home, you're probably passionate about books. But does that necessarily make you a book collector? The process for an avid collector can involve logistical planning, research, networking and appraisals, as Anthony Knight explains.
Frank Moorhouse -- The control of the imagination
10/10/2008
The fallout from the Bill Henson photos of teenagers continues.
The Australia Council recently asked for submissions on the depiction of children in art. It plans to develop protocols for artists around this subject.
Frank Moorhouse has long been involved in anti-censorship campaigns.
This is part of a presentation he gave at the National Young Writers' Festival about the control of the imagination.
In this speech, Frank Moorhouse looks into what he sees as the implications for arts, literature and freedom of expression of these possible Australia Council protocols.
2008 Nobel Prize for Literature winner
10/10/2008
The winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature was announced last night. This year the prize has gone to French writer Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clezio. Speaking to reporters in Paris, Le Clezio said he was very honoured and when asked if he deserved the prize he replied "Why not?". Dr Jacqueline Dutton, head of French Studies at the University of Melbourne, has met Le Clezio and written a book about his work. She and Professor James English, author of The Economy of Prestige: Prizes, Awards and the Circulation of Cultural Value, discuss the prize with Ramona Koval.
10 things about the National Young Writers' Festival
08/10/2008
The National Young Writers' Festival is described as random, emerging, fresh, collaborative, rejuvenatating and DIY.
The Book Show's Sarah L'Estrange went to This is Not Art in Newcastle to report on its 10th anniversary. The writers' festival is part of that broader event.
Herding Kites - 10 years of writing from the National Young Writers' Festival
08/10/2008
Herding Kites is the anthology of writings from a decade of the National Young Writers Festival.
The festival is part of the broader This is Not Art event which includes parallel festivals: Sound Summit, Electrofringe, and Critical Animals.
Each year, poets, graphic novelists, established writers and emerging voices converge in Newcastle in a writers' festival unlike any of the major literary events that happen in the capital cities each year.
Herding Kites features well known authors like Anna Funder and Max Barry but also many unknown writers who go to the festival to share ideas and network...in their own particularly anarchic way.
Michael Williams is the editor of this collection.
Junot Diaz gives thanks to literature
02/10/2008
Junot Diaz is author of the Pulitzer prize winning novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. The story of a fat, nerdy boy, a migrant from the Dominican Republic, like Diaz himself, who now lives in the United States.
Junot Diaz was invited to give the closing address at the Sydney Writers' Festival and gave a gracious, charming and thoughtful address in which he thanked the many people who contribute to the celebration of books and literature, from festival volunteers to readers and librarians. This is part of what he had to say.
Examining the Booker prize
30/09/2008
How significant are literary prizes? We examine the much-hyped Man Booker Prize, awarded to a novel written by a citizen of the Commonwealth or Republic of Ireland. This year's winner will be announced on October 14th and Australia's claiming two writers on the short list, Steve Toltz and Aravind Adiga.
Toad, Mole and Anne of Green Gables turn 100 Read Transcript
29/09/2008
We celebrate the centenary of two books which have had enduring appeal for children and adults: Anne of Green Gables by LM Montgomery, about plucky, red-haired orphan Anne Shirley, and Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows, featuring the wonderful animal characters of Mole, Badger, Ratty and Toad of Toad Hall.
Odysseys and nostalgia - Arnold Zable with Julian Burnside
26/09/2008
In his new book Sea of Many Returns Arnold Zable introduces a mythic element into the modern immigrant experience. This book is set in part on the Greek Island of Ithaca and it's a Homeric tale about emigration to Australia and the memories, people and history that trail in the wake of these journeys.
At the Melbourne Writers' Festival, Arnold Zable speaks with his friend, Julian Burnside, barrister and refugee advocate, about his new book.
Terry Pratchett - other realities Read Transcript
19/09/2008
Terry Pratchett's Discworld arrived 25 years ago with the publication of The Colour of Magic in 1983. Since then he's written more than 30 novels in the Discworld series, as well as other fantasy and alternate-reality books. His other worlds have made Terry Pratchett an international bestseller as well as earning him an OBE for services to literature and a Carnegie Medal for his children's novel The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents. At this year's Edinburgh International Book Festival Terry Pratchett talked about other realities and introduced his most recently published book Nation.
The Reading Room installation
18/09/2008
A 'cacophony' of books -- this is how Jayne Dyer describes the door sized photographs in her art exhibition called The Reading Room.
The exhibition is, in part, based on her residency at the historic Elizabeth Bay House in Sydney, where the famous McCleay library began -- and then ended a mere few years later -- in the early days of the colony.
The Book Show's Sarah L'Estrange went to Uber Gallery, a small art space in Melbourne where the installation is on show, where artist Jayne Dyer gave her a tour of The Reading Room.
An instinct for short stories: Anne Enright Read Transcript
15/09/2008
From the Edinburgh International Book Festival Irish novelist, short story writer and winner of last year's Man Booker Prize, Anne Enright, speaks to Ramona about her instinct for the short story form and about how to craft those sorts of short, sharp tales that pick you up, hold you and then leave you breathless and unsettled.
Patrick French on VS Naipaul Read Transcript
11/09/2008
Patrick French has won awards for his biography of the explorer Francis Younghusband and for his writing on India. The World Is What It Is is his authorised biography of VS Naipaul, which reads like a novel in its arresting study of the man himself, like history as we move through Naipaul's life, and like a work of literary criticism in its examination of Naipaul's writing.
AJ Mackinnon's unlikely voyage Read Transcript
10/09/2008
Jack de Crow is the name AJ Mackinnon gave to his eleven-foot dingy. He named it after a tame crow which would visit the school in England where he was teaching at the time. Sandy Mackinnon set off on his very own 'boys own adventure' in that tiny boat, known as a Mirror dingy. He sailed from the border of North Wales to the Black Sea. He recounts these tales in his book The Unlikely Voyage of Jack de Crow.
For The Book Show Pollyanna Sutton caught up with Sandy Mackinnon at the recent Byron Bay Writers' Festival.
Barry Maitland in conversation at the Melbourne Writers' Festival Read Transcript
25/08/2008
Barry Maitland is known for his forensic police procedurals featuring the investigative pair of Detective Chief Inspector David Brock and Detective Sergeant Kathy Kolla of Scotland Yard's Serious Crime Unit, but his latest work breaks the mould. The novel, called Bright Air, is set in Australia and, unlike his other work, it's written in the first person, making it a more personal and interior narrative that explores psychological conflicts along with investigating the crime.
The be-bop of writing Read Transcript
21/08/2008
For every style of jazz, whether it's trad, cool, be-bop or acid, there are probably as many literary responses to the music.
There was F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby in the Jazz Age of the 20s; in the 1960s Jack Kerouac experimented with spontaneous bop prose; and Toni Morrison's novel Jazz has elements of improvisation in its style of writing.
Not surprisingly, these examples of the links between jazz and writing all come from the USA, but how strong are these connections in Australia?
The National Jazz Writing Competition is trying to tap in to these links. It's the only competition of its kind in Australia, and in previous years it's celebrated the reviewing of jazz music reviews. This year, the competition asked for short stories -- for fictional responses to music.
The winner of the award is being announced at the Melbourne Writers' Festival.
David Sedaris engulfed in flames Read Transcript
20/08/2008
Self-deprecating writer David Sedaris was 'humorist of the year' in 2001 after his book Me Talk Pretty One Day received rave reviews. Sedaris has written six mostly autobiographical works. His latest is When You Are Engulfed in Flames. He is doing a tour of Australia and is a guest at this year's Melbourne Writers' Festival.
Obscene: the literary world of Barney Rosset
19/08/2008
American entrepreneur and publisher Barney Rosset mounted landmark, and ultimately successful, legal battles for free speech over the right to publish an uncensored version of Lady Chatterley's Lover and over Henry Miller's controversial novel Tropic of Cancer. He introduced Americans to writers such as Samuel Beckett, Eugène Ionesco and Harold Pinter and published many of the writers of the Beat generation, including William Burroughs and Jack Kerouac. Filmmakers Neil Ortenberg and Daniel O'Connor have recorded the achievements of this passionate, and at times infamous, crusader for free expression in their documentary Obscene.
Writers as Readers: Samuel Wagan Watson Read Transcript
13/08/2008
At this year's Sydney Writers' Festival a number of prominent Australian authors gave us a tour of their bookshelves. On The Book Show we've heard from Christos Tsiolkas, Luke Davies and Helen Garner. Today Indigenous poet Samuel Wagan Watson discusses his influences, not so much from his bookshelves as from his CD rack.
Samuel Wagan Watson grew up in a political household during the Bjelke-Petersen years in Queensland. His father, Sam Watson, was a prominent Aboriginal activist. The young Samuel listened to Janis Joplin and the Doobie Brothers, but when he said he wanted to be a rock star, his father was not impressed.
Samuel Wagan Watson never fulfilled his musical dreams, but turned his lyrical gifts to poetry. In 2005 he won the New South Wales Premier's Literary Award for Poetry for his collection Smoke Encrypted Whispers.
Fay Weldon: Edinburgh International Book Festival (repeat)
07/08/2008
Since Fay Weldon's Down Among the Women, written in the 1970s, she has written about subjects from cloning to cuckolding. In The Spa Decameron, ten women meet at a spa over Christmas and New Year and indulge in ten days of pampering and talking together. It's, in a sense, again 'down among the women', but this time the women are high achievers -- mortgage brokers, judges, and even journalists.
(First broadcast 6/9/2007)
Writers as readers: Luke Davies Read Transcript
23/07/2008
At the recent Sydney Writers' Festival a number of prominent Australian authors talked about what they read and the books that have inspired them.
Luke Davies is a novelist, poet and screenwriter currently trying his luck in LA. He's the author of the recently published God of Speed and his book Candy was made into a film. It focuses on young lovers who are in a spiral of heroin addiction.
Luke Davies was himself an addict 20 years ago and in this talk he guides us through the books that penetrated his drug induced haze and re-introduced him to the world of emotions and feeling.
Memoir sojourn -- life writing in Paris Read Transcript
07/07/2008
The schedule for one memoir writing workshop in Paris goes something like this: day one—arrive, day two—explore the local environs, day three—learn about literary Paris, and on the fourth day learn to write your own memoir. For the next two weeks do workshops, indulge in coffee and cake from the local boulangerie and, of course, write.
Patti Miller is the tour leader for the University of Sydney's Writing in Paris: Memoir Sojourn that combines writing workshops with travel. Pamela Bradley went to Paris on a writing sojourn and she's recently published her own memoir Nefertiti Street. They give some tips about writing holidays.
Miles Franklin Award winner 2008 - Steven Carroll Read Transcript
20/06/2008
Steven Carroll has won this year's Miles Franklin award for his novel The Time We Have Taken, the third book in a series chronicling the life of a family in an emerging Melbourne suburb.
The series begins in the 1950s, with The Art of the Engine Driver, moves into the 60s with The Gift of Speed, and lands in the 70s with The Time We Have Taken.
The Book Show's Rhiannon Brown interviewed Steven Carroll in 2007. Find transcript and audio here.
The future of the Miles Franklin Read Transcript
20/06/2008
Literary critic Geordie Williamson reflects on the impact of the Miles Franklin award on Australian literature in its 51-year history. He says that a part of Miles Franklin's dream for this award remains unrealised. In an article in The Australian he said he'd like to see the past winners reprinted before the close of the award's 51st year.
Reading by touch -- braille
08/06/2008
In braille, words and meaning are formed by dots on the page, fingers do the reading. It's an ingenious system that was developed by Louise Braille so that people with no vision could still have access to the world of ideas and information contained in fiction, but also street directories and train timetables.
Braille is as important for blind people as print is for sighted people, but, only a small portion of all printed texts are translated into braille.
The International Council of English Braille conference was held in Melbourne recently, and to coincide with this event, a public art installation called Braille Window was set up in the foyer of the conference venue.
The outside surface of the large streetfront window was covered with braille embossed A4 transparencies. The braille text was written by blind and low-vision people.
For the Book Show, Sarah L'Estrange spoke to the creators and contributors to the Braille Window.
Reading by touch -- braille
03/06/2008
In braille, words and meaning are formed by dots on the page, fingers do the reading. It's an ingenious system that was developed by Louise Braille so that people with no vision could still have access to the world of ideas and information contained in fiction, but also street directories and train timetables.
Braille is as important for blind people as print is for sighted people, but, only a small portion of all printed texts are translated into braille.
The International Council of English Braille conference was held in Melbourne recently, and to coincide with this event, a public art installation called Braille Window was set up in the foyer of the conference venue.
The outside surface of the large streetfront window was covered with braille embossed A4 transparencies. The braille text was written by blind and low-vision people.
For the Book Show, Sarah L'Estrange spoke to the creators and contributors to the Braille Window.
Below Tree Level - Hobart Mountain Festival
20/03/2008
Moss, mulch, ferns, fungus, lush, green -- what do you imagine when you think of the rainforest? Do you idealise nature or are you disturbed by the decay and rotting logs?
Going for a walk in the forest can be a welcome relief from our busy lives, but there's also a murky side to nature.
Below Tree Level is an illustrated story that plays on the uneasiness that we can feel when we go bush.
While the story has been published as a book, at the moment you can also read it on the wilderness interpretation signs on a Mount Wellington walking track in Hobart. It's part of Hobart's Mountain Festival.
The Book Show's Sarah L'Estrange spoke to the author Benny Walter and the illustrator, Leigh Rigozzi, about the moody story they created.
Germaine Greer: Edinburgh International Book Festival
25/01/2008
The irrepressible intelligence of Germaine Greer has recently been applied to a subject she knows a lot about. She did her PhD in 1968 on the ethic of love and marriage in Shakespeare's early comedies, and in her latest book Shakespeare's Wife, she takes another look at the marriage of William Shakespeare and Anne Hathaway. The marriage has had a very bad press from generations of Oxford and Cambridge dons, who regarded it as cold and loveless. But Germaine argues that Anne has been undervalued both for what she meant to Shakespeare and what she contributed to his work.
This lecture was recorded by the Book Show at the Edinburgh International Book Festival.
Armistead Maupin: Brisbane Writers' Festival Read Transcript
23/01/2008
San Francisco writer and gay activist Armistead Maupin, author of the best-selling series Tales of The City, in conversation with Ramona Koval at the Brisbane Writers' Festival about his most recent book, Michael Tolliver Lives.
After 18 years, Maupin has returned to Barbary Lane in this new book which is another love song to Maupin's adopted home. Tolliver was of course the beloved hero of the Tales of The City series, a man who has been living with AIDS for a long time now. The book begins with Michael being greeted by a man he passes in the street who says 'You're supposed to be dead'.
So Michael Tolliver has survived with AIDS into his late fifties, and has even fallen in love and married his much younger husband Ben. Here, from the 2007 Brisbane Writers' Festival is Armistead Maupin. And a warning: there's sexually explicit language and adult themes in what you're about to hear.
Pat Barker: Edinburgh International Book Festival Read Transcript
22/01/2008
Booker prize winning writer Pat Barker, whose Regeneration trilogy made her famous for her moving portrayal of shell shock victims in the First World War, returns to that battle front in her latest book. Life Class looks at a group of artists at the famous Slade art school and the debates around what are fitting subjects to be portrayed in art -- is it the beauty or the reality of life?
Desert writers' walk ... the Larapinta Trail
03/01/2008
Travel writer Robyn Davidson says that she was transformed by her experience of trekking across the desert.
Big open spaces are inspirational -- and don't they just make you want to write?
Last June, Into the Blue, which organises creative getaways, took a group of writers into the central Australian desert for a week of writing and walking along the Larapinta Trail.
For the Book Show, Sarah L'Estrange spoke to Jan Cornall, the desert writers guide, and to Rowena Harding Smith, a psychologist who was one of the walkers.
