24 August –
2 September
There’s nothing more satisfying than a bookshelf groaning under the weight of new reads – pages filled with places to discover and characters to meet. To get you in the mood for MWF18, we’re offering one lucky lit-lover the chance to win a Year of Reading, 52 books from this year’s Festival. While we can’t reveal…
The Jaipur Literature Festival has, in its 10 years, redefined what a literature festival is. It’s free, open to all. It’s a crazy riot of colour and music. It’s fun, even exciting. And it’s cool. For the past five days, the festival has been the place for young Indians to meet friends, be seen, take…
by Marieke Hardy, MWF Artistic Director I am beyond giddy to begin my adventures with MWF and the team of goodhearts here. Stepping into Lisa Dempster’s formidable shoes is both daunting and a great honour – I’ve loved the world and community Lisa has built over the last five years and can only doff my…
Australia recorded its first official death from AIDS six months after I was born: July 1983 at Melbourne’s Prince Henry Hospital. The man was 43 years old. He was the first Australian casualty and wouldn’t be the last. Being 29 means I’m old enough to vividly remember the Grim Reaper advertisements from 1987, but young…
On Sunday 31 August at 3pm, Sydney Opera House will broadcast live from the Festival of Dangerous Ideas 2014 into Fed Square, giving Melbourne audiences a taste of #FODI. Hosted by FODI favourite Jane Caro, it will feature 45 minutes of highlights from talks from the first day of the festival and interviews with speakers,…
Ally Scale is a podcast enthusiast who produced a series of podcasts for Writers Victoria in 2014. She also collaborated with Writers Bloc and All The Best on the podcast episode Baby Teeth. Ally is a 2015 MWF Development intern. I love the tactile experience of reading a book. But when it’s peak hour on public…
To celebrate International Womens Day, Festival Director Lisa Dempster and Program Manager Jo Case have put together a list (in no particular order) of 1o women writers to look out for this year: 1. Kim Gordon – Former Sonic Youth singer/bassist, her memoir Girl in a Band is getting great reviews and earning comparisons to Patti Smith’s…
Australia’s best writers – shortlistees and winners of the 2016 Prime Minister’s Literary Awards – share their favourite books of the year. Karen Lamb, joint winner in Non-Fiction for Thea Astley: Inventing her Own Weather My book choice for 2016 is the just released book Little Fish Are Sweet by Matthew Condon. It takes me back to…
Laura Woollett is a Perth-born, Melbourne-based author and aspiring screenwriter. Her first novel The Wood of Suicides was published in early 2014 and she was the winner of the 2014 John Marsden/ Hachette Prize for Fiction. She is currently working on a novel and TV pilot entitled Beautiful Revolutionary about a young couple who enter…
Literature at the heart of city’s pulse MWF celebrates the exchange of ideas, the capacity for human ingenuity and imagination, as well as building a broad, inclusive literary community in the World’s Most Liveable City Led by the zealous literary guru and organiser-in-chief Lisa Dempster, this year’s Melbourne Writers Festival had a distinctly grassroots flavour…
Guest post by Sean Fallon When I spoke to people who were loving Melbourne Writers Festival, I couldn’t help but say, “I was an Audience Advocate for this year’s Festival.” And they would look at me with wide eyes and say, “What’s that?” The Audience Advocates are a group of 12 literary-minded individuals brought together…
Melbourne Writers Festival has teamed up with Victoria University once again for the Reviewer for a Day program. Discover more MWF15 reviews on the VU Blog. This is Sarah Halfpenny’s review of Aussie Bestsellers, edited by Vanessa Wiltshire. Halfpenny has a name that sounds like it’s straight out of a Bond movie (but is really annoying to spell…
I am a big fan of blogging as a platform for creativity and communication – in fact, across three years as MWF Director I have brought some of the world’s best international bloggers to Melbourne to take part in the fun of the festival, including Bike Snob NYC, Tavi Gevinson, Brain Pickings and, this year,…
