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Byron Writers Festival 2016: Where Stories Take You… Welcome to the 2016 Byron Writers Festival! This milestone year is our 20th anniversary with a stellar line-up of 150-plus writers and thinkers converging on Byron Bay for Australia’s largest regional writers’ festival. They will engage you in enlightening discussions throughout 123 sessions at the Festival site at Elements of Byron, and during the feature events and writing workshops that comprise this spirited, stimulating Festival. The inspiration for this year’s Festival stems from our new brand and tagline: Where Stories Take You.
Conceived by Kevin Finn of TheSumOf, it recognises ‘the courage, wonder, joy, creativity and transformational power of storytelling represented through the exchange of compelling ideas in an accessible way’. The Festival celebrates the stories in us all – myriad tales that provide resonance to our lives. The program explores the importance and power of literature and debate through storytelling and the benefits that flow from these discussions. The Festival has always showcased contemporary
Photo Kate Holmes
political issues. Recent global events and the Australian election have heightened the political realities governing our world and our children’s futures. We will debate these issues, guided by expert political minds. We will also celebrate the importance of reading for kids: the pathway to all learning. Sunday is a major drawcard for families in the region with Kids Big Day Out, a chance to make favourite stories come alive, to meet some of Australia’s most talented children’s writers. Many feature sessions have already sold out but the
relaxed nature of the event means you will be able to mingle with your favourite novelists and commentators during the three-day Festival. Thank you to the Byron Shire community for your immensely enthusiastic support of the 20th Anniversary Festival and sincere thanks to the writers, commentators and performers whose energising creativity will surely affect us. You are warmly invited to join us and discover where 2016 Byron Writers Festival stories will take you. Edwina Johnson Festival Director
20 years of the nourishing Byron Writers Festival John Howard had not long moved into Paul Keating’s bedroom at the Lodge when we started our Festival 20 years ago. September 11 had not happened and Elton John’s Candle in the Wind was top of the charts. The first Harry Potter book was drawing children back to the magic of reading after a long drift away. It all seems like such a long time ago. Are things automatically better because they are older, because of longevity? Are festivals in particular better experiences for the visitors just because they have hung around and survived the turbulence of taste? No they are not. Often they lose their juice. Their energy fades and the programmers and teams
involved stop stretching themselves and asking the single most important question we all must ask when we are running an event: How can I improve this experience for our guests? At Byron Writers Festival we have spent 20 years trying hard to improve the experience for everyone who attends. By using surveys and constant community engagement we hope that now two decades along we have been able to offer anyone who buys a ticket a unique experience. The best experience we can possibly provide. If you have never been to our Festival please make a note to self: Buy Ticket. For 20 years people have
Photo Kate Holmes
said the following to me after attending their first event: ‘I thought the Festival was just for writers and that’s why I did not come along before. ‘It’s so not just for
writers… It’s a real north coast experience… It’s a cultural event in a tent.’ Byron Writers Festival is for everyone, so please get a ticket and join us.
I want to say thank you as we launch our 20th Festival. Thank you to the large passionate local community who volunteer each year to help us run a world-class event in our own region. Thank you also to our many partners and sponsors who have with toil and money supported us all these years. Your generosity has allowed us to provide a platform for the adults and kids in our community to engage with ideas and stories, and writers and poets and musicians and screen writers and journalists from Australia and from all over the world. I also want to thank the Board members, who are all volunteers, and the fabulous directors (eight in total) and
staff who have all worked tirelessly and passionately to program and run what is one of Australia’s best cultural events. Finally, I want to thank everyone who has bought a ticket at any time during our 20-year history. We really appreciate your support. This is my last year as Chair of the event and I want to say finally that being part of Byron Writers Festival has nourished my soul for 20 years. To anyone contemplating community work in our wonderful part of the world in which we are all blessed to live and work… Just do it. The rewards are amazing. Chris Hanley Founder and Chair Byron Writers Festival
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Among the festival highlights Where do stories take you? For more than 150 writers, thinkers, commentators and thousands of patrons the answer is simple – to our home here in Byron Bay to celebrate the 20th Anniversary of Australia’s largest regional literary event, Byron Writers Festival. Among the international guests sharing their stories are lauded American satirist and political commentator P J O’Rourke, best-selling UK novelist Louise Doughty (Black Water, Apple Tree Yard); Irish writer Evelyn Conlon whose epic novel Not The Same Sky traces the forced migration of young orphaned Irish girls to Australia; Spanish ex-police officer Victor del Arbol whose novel The Day Before Almost Everything won this year’s Premio Nadal, Spain’s oldest and most prestigious literary award; and three powerful Indian writers – novelist and human rights activist Salma, memoirist Rosalyn D’Mello and poet Sharanya Manivannan – whose works are featured in Walking Towards Ourselves: Indian Women Tell Their Stories, an anthology of personal narratives exploring India’s gender revolution. They are joined by an impressive contingent of US writers including Pulitzer prizewinner William Finnegan (Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life); Cheryl Strayed whose
American satirist P J O’Rourke. Photo James Kegley best-selling book Wild detailed her extraordinary solo hike along America’s Pacific Crest Trail; novelist and poet Jeffery Renard Allen whose contemporary American masterpiece Song of the Shank was inspired by the real-life story and musical genius of ‘autistic savant’ slave Blind Tom; and young writer Angela Flournoy who has recently burst onto the global literary scene with her debut novel The Turner House.
Internationally renowned Australian writers Anna Funder, Tom Keneally and Drusilla Modjeska join Texasbased Australian Dominic Smith (The Last Painting of Sara de Vos), this year’s Stella Prizewinner Charlotte Wood (The Natural Way of Things) and performer Magda Szubanski, who has elegantly transitioned from the screen to the page with her fascinating and award-winning memoir Reckoning.
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Journalist and interviewer Sarah Ferguson, author of The Killing Season: Uncut.
Post-election politics and the important issues facing Australians are hot topics of debate with Bob Brown, Tony Windsor, Tim Fischer and John Faulkner all taking part in sessions along with leading Australian commentators, journalists and thinkers Kerry O’Brien, Sarah Ferguson, Anne Summers, Julia Baird and Ross Coulthart. While the Annabel Crabb and Leigh Sales Literary Dinner has sold out, you can catch them at various sessions at the Festival. Reconciliation and race will be centre stage when fellow journalist Stan Grant delivers the annual Thea Astley Festival Address. Don’t miss Robert Dessaix’s acclaimed lecture on how Enid Blyton changed his life and award-winning architect Peter Stutchbury discussing all matters architectural including the future of housing with AGNSW Director Michael Brand. Photojournalists Ben Bohane, Tim Page, Cameron Bloom and celebrated Indonesian photographer and writer Rio Helmi reveal the worlds inside their lenses, while former addict Luke Williams (Ice Age) and Matt Noffs (Breaking the Ice) share their firsthand insights into the nation’s ‘methamphetamine crisis’. John Marsden, Lucy Clark, Gabbie Stroud and Catherine Keenan debate the pressing issues in education and literacy. Musician Paul Kelly discusses and sings Shakespeare; beloved cartoonist Michael Leunig shares his musings; Wendy Whiteley, Janet Hawley and Indira Naidoo invite us into their gardens big and small; Michael Brand together with artist Nigel Milsom and his subject Charles Waterstreet unpack the Archibald Prize and the tables are turned on radio stars Richard Glover and Richard Fidler when they take their turns in the hot seat as interview subjects.
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THE SECRET SEDUCTION and the Enigma of Attraction by Victoria Thompson
“Victoria Thompson writes erotica so well and so bravely. The sensuality of this book is outstanding. But of course it isn’t its main theme. I read this as a haunting tale of two complicated, wounded, intelligent people trying to redeem themselves –Š”‘—‰Š ‡ƒ…Š ‘–Š‡”ǥ Ž‘‘Â?‹Â?‰ ˆ‘” •ƒŽ˜ƒ–‹‘Â? ƒÂ?† ƒŽÂ?‘•– Ƥ Â?†‹Â?‰ ‹–Ǥ Š‹• ‹• ƒ Š‡ƒ”–„”‡ƒÂ?‹Â?‰ „‘‘Â?Ǥdz Č‚ ‡‡ ‘ˆÂ?ƒÂ?ÇĄ ƒ—–Š‘”
www.victoriathompson.com.au 26 August 3, 2016 The Byron Shire Echo
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A feast of special events for 2016 The Festival has again partnered with local arts organisations to present additional offsite special events outside Byron Bay. These include Magda Szubanski in conversation with Australian playwright Hannie Rayson, in association with NORPA at Lismore City Hall. A Surfing Life features William Finnegan in conversation with Sean Doherty at Lennox Head Cultural and Community Centre, in association with Lennox Arts Board. The 2015 Archibald Prize winner Nigel Milsom and his subject Charles Waterstreet are in conversation with Dr Michael Brand at Tweed Regional Gallery. Arts Northern Rivers will launch Our Way Stories, The Elders Book Project at Elements of Byron at 4pm on Festival Friday. Here’s a taste of some of the feature events on offer:
Magda Szubanski Friday August 5, 6.30pm NORPA at Lismore City Hall $30, presented in partnership with NORPA. One of Australia’s most beloved performers, Magda
real farmers, real food Wiradjuri man Stan Grant. Photo Kathy Luu Szubanski, will share her journey of self-discovery as recently revealed in her extraordinary memoir Reckoning. From a suburban childhood, haunted by the demons of her father’s espionage activities in wartime Poland and by her secret awareness of her sexuality, to the complex dramas of adulthood and her need to find out the truth about herself and her family. Don’t miss Magda in conversation with playwright Hannie Rayson.
Michael Leunig
Hello, Beautiful!
Friday August 5, 7pm Byron Theatre $30. Much-loved artist Michael Leunig has delighted Australians with his incisive cartoons for the past five decades. He joins The Sydney Morning Herald literary editor Susan Wyndham to discuss his life’s work.
Hannie Rayson’s onewoman show, Saturday 6 August 6, 8pm Byron Theatre $30. Hello, Beautiful! is a funny, big-hearted one-woman show, written and performed by one of Australia’s best-loved playwrights, Hannie Rayson. In Hello, Beautiful! Hannie shares intimate and hilarious stories of her life.
Literary Dinner: Political Persuasions
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Stan Grant
Michael Leunig self-portrait.
Saturday August 6, 6pm Byron Theatre $30. Wiradjuri man Stan Grant’s celebrated speech on racism went viral. Now he has written Talking to My Country. He joins David Leser to urge all Australians to think how we can do better.
Contact and tickets for Byron Writers Festival Website: www.byronwritersfestival.com Phone: 02 6685 5115 Please check our website or Facebook page for updates and Festival news.
BYO bottle for water refills At this year’s Byron Writers Festival there will be no onsite sales of bottled water. There will be a large refill station serving free water, and if you forget to bring your bottle from home there will be Byron Writers Festival aluminium water bottles for sale at the merchandise stand. With your help, we will be eliminating the waste of around 3,000 water bottles! Thanks to our partner Byron Shire Council for sponsoring this initiative.
North Coast news daily: www.echonetdaily.net.au
The Byron Shire Echo August 3, 2016 27
4 Writing Blind – the story of Blind Tom, musician Mandy Nolan Jeffery Renard Allen’s novel Song of the Shank was inspired by the real-life story of genius musician and slave Blind Tom, who was the first African American to perform at the White House. A contemporary American masterpiece about music, race, an unforgettable man, and an unreal America during the Civil War era, the novel was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award. I asked Allen about it. Who was Blind Tom and why were you drawn to him? Thomas Greene Wiggins was born a slave in Georgia in 1849 and went on to become possibly the most famous pianist and musical performer of the 19th century. Under the stage name Blind Tom, he started giving recitals when he was six years old and at ten he played at the White House, the first African American to do so. History has been unkind to Wiggins because he is usually characterised as an ‘autistic savant’, and for that
my political and social concerns. Still, politics aside, I am first and foremost a writer, and I am writing books for people who like good books. This in and of itself is a tremendous personal struggle of commitment, energy, and sacrifice.
reason he is seen not as a true artist and creator. Tom’s life in so many ways speaks to the myriad questions about race, racism, bigotry. So I decided to tell Tom’s story in my novel at a time that is under-represented in fictional narratives. My novel is set during the time of Reconstruction, one of the great failures of American history and democracy. The legacy of that failure is very much with us today in the ongoing struggle that we face as black people in the USA for justice and equality, for equitable treatment under the law, for fairness and access and education.
What is the influence of music on your writing? Especially in terms of form and subject?
Do you think these stories are uncomfortable for white Americans – that history tends to get, dare I say it, ‘whitewashed’, in films and fiction?
Jeffery Renard Allen. Photo Mark Hillringhouse
Yes, I am sure that many white Americans are uncomfortable with my work because I write from a place of truth as I know it. America is a great country, but it is also a dishonest and hypocritical country that refuses to own
up to its past. A country that slaughtered Native Americans and took their lands from them, an ongoing process of genocide. A country that enslaved millions of black people, then for another century deprived
28 August 3, 2016 The Byron Shire Echo
them of constitutional rights and stood by and let homegrown terrorists murder them by the thousands. That allowed and continues to allow black people to suffer all sorts of deprivations and be denied fair due pro-
cess under the law. A country that has supported dictators around the world and overthrown governments, then wonders why we have so many enemies. America needs this slanted belief in its white heroism, and it needs to believe that everybody else is at fault, that everyone else is a ‘loser,’ to quote Donald Trump, the repugnant liar, fraud, and opportunist who is seeking to become our next president. That said, I am also certain that many white readers enjoy my work for its quality but also because they share
Black people in this country made their first important and distinctive contributions to art in the form of music. Our literature is still trying to catch up, especially we fiction writers. Perhaps the poets have done a better job since poetry lends itself to music, or at least certain kinds of music. As for my own work, I am especially interested in how certain musicians layer sound and I strive for the same quality in my work. So I think of something like John Coltrane’s thick sound on the tenor saxophone, tones in the voice of a Bessie Smith, Laila Hathaway, Sarah Vaughn, or Beyonce. I think of
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and slave Jimi Hendrix’s version of the Star Spangled Banner, not only the famous live performance at Woodstock but also the studio recording that has ten or twelve overdubbed guitars. That’s one of the things I’m striving for, a thickness – of language, of feeling. But writing can never be music and can never have the directness of feeling of a great song. I think it’s hard as an artist to really make narratives about black people in America without understanding something about music. Novelist and critic Albert Murray spoke often about what he called the ‘vernacular imperative’, an effort to draw from African American idioms like the blues and jazz and create literature. Ours is a heroic American story, when you consider all that we have faced and continue to face, our struggle. Great literature is about struggle, about trying to ‘make a way out of no way’, as old folk say.
of crack cocaine into black communities in the 1980s represented an ‘apocalyptic moment’. Can you elaborate a little more?
Your first novel, Rails Under My Back, has been re-issued. You are quoted as saying the introduction
Q To read the full interview
I grew up black and poor in Chicago in the sixties and seventies, a time that certainly had its problems. However, the crack epidemic brought an unprecedented level of violence, despair, and desperation to the world that I knew, and to the vast majority of black communities across America. That was our apocalypse, which coincided with the AIDS epidemic that continued into the nineties. The weird thing is that this real but almost speculative world saw very little representation in serious arts. There were of course tons of bad movies, along with plenty of bad music, gangster rap, that glorified violence and drugs, so that was the challenge I gave myself from the standpoint of an artist.
5 A special additional session Lovely spot for a festival with Sarah Ferguson Don’t miss Gold Walkley award-winning journalist Sarah Ferguson in conversation with fellow journalist Matthew Condon probing The Killing Season Uncut. This is the book that delves behind the scenes of Sarah’s captivating ABC TV series, candidly revealing the stories behind the interviews. Sarah Ferguson in conversation with Matthew Condon, Feros Marquee, 1.45pm–2.45pm Sunday August 7.
with Jeffery Renard Allen go to Byron Writers Festival blog at byronwritersfestival.com.
Aerial photo of the writers festival site courtesy of Elements of Byron.
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6 Kids Big Day Out – Sunday is a Festival Fun-day for children! Exploding chickens, stilt walkers, slam poetry and the chance to meet your favourite authors and illustrators – Kids Big Day Out at Byron Writers Festival on Sunday has got it all! New Festival partners, The Farm Byron Bay, have come on board this year to make Kids Big Day Out at the Festival site at Elements of Byron even more fun.
Get your hands dirty in the mini-garden pots with Farmer Johnson or get crafty and creative with Trudi from Farm Kids. Every Kids Big Day Out ticket includes a complimentary tour of The Farm Byron Bay at a later date! Featured authors at Kids Big Day Out include Kate Forsyth (The Impossible Quest series), Anna Fienberg (Tashi series, Figaro and Rumba),
Grinspoon’s Pat Davern (Alexander the Elephant in Zanzibar), Tristan Bancks (My Life series), Damon Young with Peter Carnavas (My Sister is a Superhero) and Nick Falk with Tony Flowers (Samurai vs Ninja).
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Children enjoy one of the Big Days Out. Photo Kaleem Horn Their grandma is coming to stay and they are not happy. They start thinking of ideas to get rid of Grandma. A swimming cap makes them shrink and then they find a velociraptor in the attic. He is cheeky,
funny and a bit creepy. I thought this story was very enjoyable and humorous. I was upset when the story ended because I wanted to read more.
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Q&As with festival guests Karl Ove Knausgaard puts it well. In his book A Man in Love, he writes: ‘Nothing could give me any peace of mind except books, with their different places, different times and different people, where I was no-one and no-one was me.’ I love that feeling while reading, of being no-one, and outside time.
The Echo asked a selection of Festival guests some quick questions. For the full interviews visit the Byron Writers Festival blog at www. byronwritersfestival.com.
Angela Flournoy (The Turner House) What are you looking forward to at Byron Writers Festival? This will be my first visit to Australia, and one of the things I’m most excited about is talking about books with festival-goers. I have heard that Australians are enthusiastic about books (which is not always the case in the US), so I’m looking forward to the in-person book nerd moments.
Where do you write?
Angela Flournoy. Photo LaToya T Duncan Which book made the greatest impact on you as a child?
Louise Doughty (Apple Tree Yard, Black Water)
There’s a very long list but I was greatly obsessed with the Narnia books. I believed them to be true and spent a rather sad amount of time hiding in wardrobes, although to be fair there wasn’t a great deal else to do in the small town in the East Midlands where I grew up.
Where do you write?
Q Join Louise Doughty with
It depends what I’m writing. I do admin at home – rewrites, emails, journalism. If I’m doing first-draft work on a book, then I have to leave the domestic arena. I go out to local cafes a lot – so much so I could write a very detailed guide to the cafes of North London. I know which ones give you a free biscuit with your coffee and who has a clean toilet. When I first arrive, the noise and the chatter is irritating but if the writing is going well, it fades into the background.
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Who should we be reading? You should be reading books by women writers of colour. All of them.
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Peggy Frew, Sofie Laguna, Tegan Bennett Daylight and Helen Garner. Recently we got a puppy and so I read, for about the third time, the truly wonderful Dog Boy by Eva Hornung. Where do stories take you?
I write all day, every day. I move around to the cheapest countries I can find so I can afford to do this. This year it’s been Indonesia and India. Last year it was Thailand and Nepal. Life’s good. What are you looking forward to at Byron Writers Festival?
Whether undertaking a weekend workshop, M bWgfRRY ^a hRMaZ^]U P^dabR͜ 3E2 ^ŪRab M d]W`dR PdaaWPdZd\ QReRZ^_RQ Oh nationally recognised professional artists. Join our mailing list at www.byronschoolofart.com BYRON SCHOOL OF ART
Robert Dessaix on Enid Blyton, P J O’Rourke with Kerry O’Brien, and the Rome panel.
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Who should we be reading? Lately I find myself reading Australian women writers. On my beside table is
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Growing up, family memoir, fatherhood and family tragedy are all themes being explored at the 20th Byron Writers Festival. Festival director Edwina Johnson says memoir sessions are always hugely popular with Byron Bay audiences. ‘Family stories are the fundament of life. We recount stories about good times and challenging ones, about milestones and memories of people, places and parenting,’ says Edwina. The Festival team were captivated by the Bloom family’s inspiring true story illustrated in Penguin Bloom. ‘Like so many people from all over the globe, we were enthralled by the gorgeous images of Penguin the Magpie with Cameron, Samantha and their three boys.’ Penguin Bloom is a unique journey of recovery and an extraordinary celebration of life featuring Cameron Bloom’s exceptional photographs and a captivating narrative by New York Times bestselling author Bradley Trevor Greive. The story begins with a shocking accident, in which Sam Bloom suffers a near fatal fall that leaves her paralysed and deeply depressed.
on Festival Saturday. Richard Glover’s favourite dinner party game is called ‘Who’s Got the Weirdest Parents?’ It’s a game he always thinks he’ll win. There was his mother, a deluded snob, who made up large swathes of her past and who ran away with Richard’s English teacher, a Tolkien devotee, nudist and stuffed-
Into their lives comes Penguin, an injured magpie chick abandoned after she fell from her nest. ‘Don’t miss Cameron and Samantha Bloom on Festival Saturday as they tell their extraordinary story with Richard Glover,’ says Johnson. Richard Glover, Elspeth Muir and Liam Pieper come together to discuss Family Memoir with Mandy Nolan
toy collector. There was his father, a distant alcoholic, who ran through a gamut of wives, yachts and failed dreams. Part poignant family memoir, part rollicking venture into a 1970s Australia, Glover’s acclaimed memoir Flesh Wounds is for anyone who’s wondered if their family is the oddest one on the planet. David Burton, Magda Szubanski, and Rosie Waterland will revisit the past in the session Growing Up. The turbulence of childhood and adolescence can have a lifelong impact on how people feel about themselves. These memoirists will discuss their early days with laughter and, no doubt, a few tears. Richard Fidler and David Leser will discuss fatherhood with Mick O’Regan on Sunday afternoon. ‘I encourage everyone interested in attending the Festival, the feature events or our workshops to purchase their tickets now as tickets are selling fast,’ says Johnson. Q Tickets are available at
www.byronwritersfestival.com. Please check the Facebook page for updates.
And the authors keep coming… No need to feel post-Festival blues. In early September, Byron Writers Festival is hosting Yann Martel, author of the bestselling Life of Pi, and Lionel Shriver, the Orange Prize-winning author of We Need to Talk About Kevin. Yann Martel will be in con-
Mountains of Portugal. Lionel Shriver in conversation with David Leser, Tuesday September 6, 6.30–7.45pm, Lismore City Hall, presented in partnership with NORPA. Tickets: $35 (Concession and Members $30). Arguably the most per-
ceptive author of our times, Lionel Shriver will discuss her new novel The Mandibles, about the decline of the United States. The Mandibles is a frightening, fascinating, scabrously funny glimpse into the decline that may await the US all too soon.
Festival site (Elements of Byron)
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versation with Matthew Condon, Thursday September 1, 6–7.15pm, Byron Theatre. Tickets $35 (Members $30). Man Booker Prize-winning author Yann Martel will visit Byron as part of his Australian tour with the highly anticipated release of The High
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Byron Bay CBD F G To Byron at Byron Resort
Sessions with AUSLAN interpreters present are marked in the Festival Program. P J O’Rourke is presented in collaboration with The Centre for Independent Studies as part of their 40th Anniversary celebrations. Rio Helmi’s appearance at 2016 Byron Writers Festival is supported by the Australian government through the Australia-Indonesia Institute of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.
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Salma, Sharanya Manivannan and Rosalyn D’Mello’s appearances at Byron Writers Festival are supported by the Australian government through the Australia-India Council. Victor Del Arbol’s appearance at 2016 Byron Writers Festival is supported by the Accion Cultural Espanola. The Byron Writers Festival is also funded by Arts NSW and the Australia Council for the Arts.
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