Write Away Newsletter of the Society of Women Writers Victoria Inc.

REG. NO. A0039632B NOVEMBER 2014 PP 381712/02477

From left to right: Beth Wunderlich, Betty Caldwell, Razmi Wahab, Tricia Veale, Janet Howie, Mary Jones (face hidden) Meryl Tobin, Lisa Kondor, Del Nightingale, Marguerite Kisvardai, Errol Broome and Agnes Chatfield.

Introduction to Facebook with Blaise van Hecke Agnes Chatfield Reports At our October meeting, Blaise introduced us to Facebook, founded by Mark Zuckerberg in 2004. She took us through the stages of creating a personal profile and how to make the most use of the technology. Blaise said, ‘Face- book’s mission is to give people the power to share and make the world more open and connected.’ Blaise is co-owner and Publisher at Busybird Publishing. continued overleaf

Society of Women Writers Victoria Inc. 73 Church Road Carrum VIC 3197 Literary Patron: Errol Broome President Committee Members Lynne Murphy Lisa Kondor Life Members: Dorothy Richards, [email protected] Mary Jones Barbara Warren, Errol Broome, Vice President Rebecca Maxwell Judy Bartosy & Dorothea Lavery Agnes Chatfield Blaise Van Hecke Yvonne Sweeney Treasurer Write Away is published monthly — Jennifer Leslie ShirleyWhiteway send articles, prose and comments for Postal Workshops Coordinator Membership Secretary publication by the 10th of each month Judith Green to the editor Judy Bartosy [email protected] Postal Workshops Editors Newsletter Editor Spring: Judith Green Jennifer Leslie Carpe Diem: Judith Green [email protected] Arianthe’s Thread: Patricia O’Keefe THE EDITOR’S LETTER THE PRESIDENT’S LETTER NOVEMBER 2014

Dear Members, It was heartening to receive positive feedback regarding the October issue of the Newsletter. Since a high standard has been reached it needs to be maintained and given all members are writers, that shouldn’t be a difficult expectation to realise. It has been pleasing to receive contributions for the November issue, the last one for 2014. I’ll take this opportunity to thank everyone who has contributed prose, poetry and articles to make the Newsletter an important part of the life the Society. Please send me your prose and poetry from the end of year competition to be published in the February issue, the first for 2015. In that issue there will be an interview with the economist, Saul Eslake about writing, economics and his favourite places. Thanks to Lynn Smailes for the timely and professional production of the Newsletter. Members please note: Dear Members, Copy Deadline 10th of each month Production 15th each month Please bring in your items for the Window Display at Ross House to the Christmas Meeting on 28 November Distribution 19th each month in the Sue Healy Room on the Mezzanine Floor beginning at 10 am. This is the last call as I will be dressing Please send (email) documents as Text Files. All photographs to be sent (emailed) separately in JPEG format. the window on Monday 1st December. A posse ad esse, The year seems to have passed so rapidly, particularly when I recall that the first Speaker for 2014 was Happy Christmas & New Year, charismatic Alan Attwood who again will be our first Speaker on March 27, 2015, on the subject of his Jennifer Leslie editorship of The Big Issue. Two of our own members have agreed to be presenters next year — Janet Howie will conduct a workshop on Haiku and Lin Van Hek will speak on Women Writers. The dates are not yet set. Email: [email protected] We have been lucky to have member Blaise Van Hecke conduct two workshops this year: in July ‘How to Edit your Work’ and in October ‘How to Place Items on Facebook’. Both of these workshops stirred interest among members and were well attended. Blaise is a dynamic presenter. Notes from Facebook Workshop In order to widen opportunities for our members who are at a workplace during weekdays and unable to attend continued from front page our Friday meetings, I am in the process of arranging Saturday workshops. These will run in partnership PERSONAL PROFILE: with the Fellowship of Australian Writers and will be held at the Masonic Hall, Brunswick. This venue Set up an account. Facebook makes it easy. is easily accessible by No.19 Tram, which runs up Elizabeth Street and along Road. The Masonic WHAT IS A Facebook PAGE? Hall is located in Davies Street, one street back (on the city side) from the Moreland Road tram stop. The It is a way for individuals, businesses, brands and organisations to share their stories and connect with people. buidling is located two doors from the intersection of Davies Street and Sydney Road. Suitable rooms there HOW IS A BUSINESS PAGE DIFFERENT FROM A PERSONAL PAGE? are much easier to hire and less expensive than we are used to paying and there is a good sized kitchen. The Personal profiles are for non-commercial use and represent individuals. If a person has designated their Profile as first Workshop — ‘Poetry with Kristen Henry’ is planned for Saturday 21 March. A further workshop on PUBLIC, you can follow their posts for updates. ‘Short Story’ is planned for May. TO ‘LIKE’ A PAGE: Remember! This is the year of our Australia-wide Biennial Literary Award. Workshops help sharpen the Click on LIKE, you can LIKE up to 5000 pages from various sources, a story, advertisement, video and so forth. brain. TO UNLIKE A PAGE: There is a change to the way the Christmas Competition is run! In answer to a plea to make the occasion less Click the name of the page on your news feed, or search for it, and select UNLIKE. formal and more fun, there are new rules. One entry per person can consist of a short, short story (one and INTERACTING WITH PAGES: a half A4 pages) — reading time THREE MINUTES — or a poem — reading time THREE MINUTES. Type your POST into the box, then TAG friends or locations. The author reads her work, or can designate another person to read it, the audience (consisting of other OTHER DIFFERENCES INCLUDE: authors and bystanders) gives points for each work presented. These are tallied at the finish and three mystery Groups and individuals can choose levels of privacy that suit their needs. prizes awarded. The theme is ‘Christmas’. PRIVACY AND REPORTING: Enjoy the holiday break, dear members! I know, after a while, you’ll get itchy fingers and start writing Facebook pages are for private and public consumption. You can choose whether to have the item private, for family interesting things to read out at the February Meeting 2015. and friends only, or to make it public. With the use of Facebook there are certain dangers, such as unwanted messages, spam, abuse, etc. However, an Best wishes ... unwanted post can be blocked or disabled. For more information about Facebook, go to the Society of Women Writers Victoria website and read or print Blaise’s presentation from Friday, 31 October 2014. Lynne Agnes Chatfield. November 2014 2 Write Away November 2014 Newsletter of the Society of Women Writers Victoria 3 This is a new development, isn’t it? Twenty-five years ago programs of this sort wouldn’t have been run by a public library. Yes and there’s a bit of history to it. In the UK there has always been a library in prisons program that was part of a philosophy of helping to better people but we didn’t have the same thing in Australia. Our prisoner’s program SWWV Editor Jennifer Leslie’s involves the Neighborhood House with us supporting it. Yes definitely, public libraries are totally different now to Interview with librarian and writer when I was a kid. When I was a child, librarians were invariably bookish, quite and serious. Women with buns but not now, I see. Fiona Baranowski Whoops! I think I have a bun today but that’s because I have outlandish hair that needs to be controlled. Just look around here, the staff are very out there and would seem shocking compared to librarians in the 1950s. Of course, you still see the ones who look like the stereotypical librarian but there’s less and less of them. Do you think a love of books is the main reason a person would choose to be a librarian or is that secondary now? I think it’s still there. We have staff who are not qualified, they’re floor staff and many of them are writers. Most staff are interested in reading and I think it would be disappointing if they weren’t. That said, looking around this library you can see technology happening and now people in IT work libraries. How long have you been working as a librarian? Technology has changed libraries but there are still the quiet people in the back room cataloguing. Twenty-five years! Goodness me! It seems one of the biggest changes is the noise factor, would you agree? When you started out, what was it like working in a library? Yes, once the library was a quiet place whereas now we all have to get on, rub up together with children running It was quieter then. I started working in a special library, attached to a research organisation so that was definitely around, babies crying and so on. I don’t cope with an overly noisy library. I try to be accommodating but insist as quiet. Not long after that, I got my first job working in a public library and it was quieter compared to now. the branch team leader that we have boundaries about behavior. Often I’ll be heard saying to children — ‘We’re not outside.’ I think some parents forget their children need to run around doing stuff outside instead of inside Apart from the noise level, what were the main differences between then and now? doing sedentary things all the time. One of the big pushes in recent times is that public libraries have been promoted as the second lounge room. Now, they are community space rather than just a plain library. This building was purpose built as a library over 130 years ago and it was unimaginable that it would be all the things it is today. You’ll meet some people who say we must have a young people’s space and in a library built What is a community space in the context of a library? that long ago it is difficult to accommodate all those things. It is a matter of getting along but it’s also all about Many libraries are based on the hub model meaning there are many things going on in the building. There might boundaries. be maternal and child health, a toy library or a singing group that meets in the space making it more community minded than previously. The angle public libraries have pushed is that we are very much a part of the community. We had a conversation a while ago about the value of a quiet place just for people’s sanity. In this library we Whether you are 0 or 110 years old, membership of a public library is free and I don’t think there is another have two levels and the quiet area is on the second floor. People use it to read the paper and contemplate. It’s community space that’s open for everybody and free of charge as well. an important area especially around here where houses tend to be small and there’s not much space to read the newspaper in a leisurely way. Would you say being a librarian now requires different skills and motivation than previously? Yes, for example I’m not a quiet and reserved person. Twenty-five years ago when I was studying, a lot of librarians You’re a writer, would you tell me about that? were retiring personalities and while those people are still attracted to libraries now there are lot of extroverts. I think my work inspires my writing. You meet all sorts of characters in a library. When I was young, I wanted to Much of the work in libraries is about community development and staff must be prepared to muck in, so to speak. be a writer but the problem was I didn’t know what to write about. I think you have to experience life before you This can lead to a bit of confusion over roles. know what to write. I have published a few pieces and I’m in a writing group that has been meeting for just over five years so we all know each other well. That’s important for building trust so you feel confident about agreeing Confusion, in what way? to other people reading your work. I do a lot of work with literacy and outreach. The outreach part is to engage with vulnerable members of the community and several members of the library staff are looking at different aspects of this service. One of my staff Describe your writing please? is doing a project with design students at RMIT about libraries and what they are as new spaces. I write a lot about family. I like to capture family stories before they’re forgotten. I describe the strange and wonderful things that happen in family life. For a while, I wrote a lot about my parents’ deaths. I was stuck on that What do you mean by outreach in the context of a library? topic for some time because when you write you go through stages. While it’s still a significant topic, I don’t write Good question. We reach out to the community and a couple of staff here actually go out of the library to about it any more. kindergartens and schools. My boss in particular is interested in the concept of libraries ‘beyond the wall’ so a library exists not just in the building. Who are your favorite writers? Alex Miller, writer. I love his work, it’s slow and lyrical. I met him recently in Queenscliff and I think You mentioned an outreach program for homeless people, please tell me more about that. he’s just one amazing writer. I read Richard Flanagan’s book, The Narrow Road to the Deep North, winner of the Recently we had involvement with an agency that looks after homeless men. The men were over the age of 18 and Man Booker and really enjoyed that so he’s up there. I thought The Sound of One Hand Clapping set in Tasmania the agency offered them a place to live for 6 months. The men had been doing an art therapy course so we talked and also written by him, was a beautiful piece of work. I think Peter Temple is a fine Australian writer and I can’t about displaying their work at the library. leave Steven Carroll off my list. He has written books about , especially about the development of places We had an exhibition with an opening night and it was a really interesting experience. I looked at these guys and like Glenroy, that I love. their faces said it all - they were so proud to have their artwork on the walls. We invited heads of agencies to the What about writers from the past? opening so they could see what we were doing in the community and the feedback was positive. We didn’t frame I’m not very good with dead writers and I’m biased towards Australian authors. the art, we stuck it to the walls with blue-tack that surprised a lot of people because in the old days no-one would have dared put anything on the walls of a public library. The library service also runs a program with guys just out Do you think there’s a difference between Australian writing and European writing? of prison to help them get back into the community. Absolutely! 4 Write Away November 2014 Newsletter of the Society of Women Writers Victoria 5 Tell me about that. Reading Poetry, 21st Century Having said that, I haven’t read many European writers. I remember reading Margaret Drabble from the time I was 18 until my early 20s and I can’t bear that genre of writing any more. It was an interesting experience. Every emotion a metaphor What do you like about Australian writing? Every situation a symbol I like the familiarity of it. I think there’s nothing more enjoyable than reading Monkey Grip and thinking about Every person a simile like someone Carlton in the 70s. I like reading about places I’ve seen or known or smelt or felt. I read a lot and at the moment half-remembered. Every landscape I’m reading the sequel to The Rosie Effect by Graeme Simsion and not enjoying it all but each to his own. a state of mind, a dream or journey And Poetry? through another poet’s work. I’m a time warp person but I also like crazy stuff, CJ Dennis for example. I have a young friend in his 20s who writes pornographic poetry — great! I’m from Irish English stock that goes back to old Vikings hence my tastes Lost in a maze tunnel nightmare are wild and crazy. my feelings computerised expressed in a robotic voice: Danny Dreaming ‘You have keyed in the wrong password. Your question is irrelevant. Your paws around my arm To rephrase your request press one. feeling love in your dream To refer to the bibliography press two. catching a mouse To speak to the poet press then letting it go Night fishing, Part 1 And then the dreams Part 3 every button you can find. the game you play Beyond the safety One day the sad Nordic god, For the poet enjoying the day of our childhood beach, The old boat, Part 2 our father, takes the boat and the to speak to you furry friends we have rowed out, bike press return.’ became good friends into an evening sky. The old boat, to the tip. arch enemies reconciled sits in dry dock, The boat rides a wave of rubbish. Return for dreams Father at the oars, under the ancient cypress. in another life a Nordic god, It still smells of salt and old bait. The boy he visits me From this high place of rock and monument nostrils flaring The pine needles collect, in my dreams. I used to gaze across familiar paddocks sleep on my dear Danny in the cradle of the boat. He scoops fish in the moonlight. towards my town of childhood- mine no more. king of the day The boy at the helm, He swims with a graceful stingray bringing me long sinewy arms, silently by. Now I see lines of roof and fence, the loop the zest of life will never become a man. After the boy dies, I want him to wave to me. of highway covered by a stream of cars trucks utes many vehicles waving fumes. The family stops fishing and camp- always around guarding the turf His head glows softly, ing I turn away, trying to draw a veil with a halo and laughing. like a sentinel across the scene, to bring back memories your meow made from moonlight. His bike leans against the shed, of times when I was starting to explore. sweet sound that shelters the boat, my beautiful His piano fingers, there is blood on the mangled bike. Once more my friends and I play hide-and-seek, Danny cat grasp the net pole, Everything in the yard, walk the long way to school, giggle at jokes, I love you so. catching stars and silver garfish. sits still for a long time. pick wildflowers and a bunch of peppercorns. Francesca Bartosy His toes touch the water Once in a garden my first love and I as the gentle tide rises, by Fiona Baranowski held hands and promised to be always true. Now a cold wind blows dust into my face. and falls. 2014 The one close to me says, ‘Want to drive through?’ I tell myself get over it and say ‘Yes’. The streets are smaller and the shops have changed,

but there is still a line of peppercorns beside the park. We stop for lunch. The sound of shouts and laughter floats from a sports ground.

Marguerite Varday 6 Write Away November 2014 Newsletter of the Society of Women Writers Victoria 7 The Sacred Mountain

Mary Jones

We were a group of 68 Australians and, as far as we could see, the only Western visitors that day among the Interestingly, Mao climbed Mount Tai. My first reaction on being told this was to wonder why. Did he actually throngs of Chinese pilgrims and tourists at Tai Shan, the most venerated of China’s five sacred mountains. We’d secretly regard it as sacred? As a good atheist Communist he should surely have believed it was just a very big arrived in the city of Taian that morning, with time for a visit to the mountain before the next day was swallowed chunk of rock, and taken the opportunity to sweep away all the deeep-seated traditions and beliefs attached up with rehearsals and an evening concert.The most dedicated visitors to Tai Shan aim to walk all the way up to it. He had no compunction in sweeping away all the delicate and subtle art forms that he replaced with from the base of the mountain, and time their arrival before dawn so that they can watch the sunrise. Our ugly chunky Soviet-style murals and statues. Perhaps even he realised that the mountain was just too massively schedule in a busy tour only allowed us a few hours in the afternoon, so we were booked on to the buses that embedded in the Chinese psyche to be swept anywhere. ferry people to half-way up. There was then a choice of 7200 steps or the cable car. Only the youngest and fittest of our party opted for the steps both up and down, though quite a few embarked on the challenge of walking While we were groping through the mist and fog in the area at the top of the cable car ride, we were approached down after taking the cable-car on the way up. by a young Chinese couple eager to practice their English. The girl was more fluent than the boy, and she was earnestly eager to know ‘how do you feel about our mountain?’ We said, as clearly and as simply as we could, that The big disappointment was the weather conditions. Although the sky was relatively clear at the base, the top we were disappointed not to be able to appreciate it properly because of the weather, and she smiled and nodded. was shrouded in thick cloud, so that the last section of the cable-car ride was an eerie, almost soundless glide Somehow it was clear to us that she felt very deeply about the place herself, proud of its significance and curious through dense whiteness. On a clear day there would have been fabulous views, much to explore and a final to know whether we as outsiders could feel its influence too. I wish now that we’d spent a little more time with climb from the South Gate to Heaven, up to the Jade Emperor Temple at the summit. But the cloud cover not her, trying to explain that we did indeed feel the underlying tranquility and holiness of the mountain, shining only completely swallowed the views but made the going very cold, wet and slippery. This was the point at which through all the distractions of the weather and the tourist crowds. I decided that the only wise way back down for my arthritic joints was the cable car. There was still plenty to see when we descended out of the cloud and the cable-car delivered us back to the Midway Gate to Heaven — a sort of staging post halfway up the mountain where the steep steps began. As in most of our China visit, we were surrounded by contrasts. The mountain managed at the same time to be a peaceful sacred place and a noisy tourist trap. Beautiful buildings that looked like small dignified temples overflowed with gaudy tat and kitsch. The visitors ranged from devout pilgrims stopping to offer prayers at shrines along the route, to giggling groups of teenagers and hard-nosed trinket vendors. But the majority of the Chinese crowds were clearly respectful of the place, and even on a dull day it was possible to feel the underlying atmosphere of beauty and tranquility. At one point we found a path that led away from the main one and didn’t have any signposts, but didn’t seem to be closed to the public. We enjoyed the quiet walk through gentle bird-song in the trees that hugged the mountain slopes, until a Chinese woman coming the other way shouted at us in Chinese and waved her arms to usher us back, and we thought we’d better not get ourselves into any trouble so we went. A group of us found some boulders to sit on, while we killed time waiting for the members of our party who’d opted to walk down the steps. Immediately we became a tourist attraction in our own right. An amazing number of Chinese stopped to take photographs of us, or asked if they could be photographed with us. Our group included a couple of blondes and a redhead, which I suppose added to the novelty value, but we were still surprised at how much interest we always seemed to attract outside the main cities of Beijing and Shanghai. Hardly any of the Chinese had any English, and we had only a few very badly-pronounced words of Chinese between us, but there was a lot of smiling and waving. As the intrepid step-descenders began to appear we were glad we’d made the decision we did not to walk down - it had clearly been an arduous journey, and taken longer than any of them had expected. By the time we reached the time deadline we’d been given for returning to the buses, there were still ten people missing, and it was a full half-hour after that before the last exhausted group of three finally made it down. Tai Shan is a World Heritage site. It has been a place of worship for 3,000 years, and is still venerated in Buddhism and Taoism. The first Emperor declared the unity of the Empire from the summit in 219 BC, and 71 other Emperors have climbed it - or, more accurately, had themselves carried up it - to perform sacrificial rituals.

It is said that those who climb to the summit will live for 100 years. ‘Elephant Trunk Peak Green Cloud Cave’, Mount Tai, Tai’an City, Shandong Province by See-ming Lee, licensed by Creative Commons

8 Write Away November 2014 Newsletter of the Society of Women Writers Victoria 9 This Most Privileged of Madnesses

Lin Van Hek

His mother had gone mad after thirty years of wifeship. It had happened whilst tending the bees. Her husband’s Beyond the bed the room caught her attention for the first time since the illness began. When the new boy, pride. She had chopped at the hives with the axe and frothed at the mouth. He thought at last he knew how his Hermann, was placed in her arms she neither held him nor made to dash him down. She looked around the room Father could go on adoring this woman who had achieved an early retirement from the labours they had chosen giving each item a studied stare as if cataloguing all that lay about her. She would not breast feed but allowed the to share. He carried on the work alone while she departed to the unknowable region. She had no language left and milk to be taken by the neighbour, Motte, who then fed it to the infant. could not tell him what it was like in that land. That she remembered him… he had no doubt, though her arms Hermann grew slowly. His mother was confined to two moods. Unable to give an account of herself, he longed for were never stretched towards him. her in vain. She did not notice him. She remained in the equilibrium of her bridled madness. In her diminished She stayed in her bedroom all day long, her head thrown back mutely on the pillow. She grew not as was expected… world she had no deviations from her remoteness save the evening journey around the farm that her husband sallow and maniacal but returned rather to the garments of her youth. Her face that had been leathered by her carried her to each day. outdoor work in all seasons began to soften and her complexion was the honey pink of her girlhood. When her Hermann was transfixed by their faces when they returned to the house after this ride, he could not recognize the husband returned from the field she gave him fetching looks. He scraped the mud from his boots and went to her look that he saw there. to see if she had regained her speech or sanity. He wished only to talk profit and loss with her as before. To the room he would trail after and watch as his Mother once more emptied her bladder and with one last In the morning he would rise early while it was still dark, heating her milk and melting the chocolate into a bowl. fetching look she whimpered herself to sleep. There were times in the day when she would be alone and would sit He held it to her lips while she drank. Washing her silent face with the hot cloth, lifting her back into the pillows. in an ever-widening arc of shit. Hermann would open the door and watch fascinated at her disconcern. The smell After she had emptied her bladder in the porcelain dish that she had once bathed her infants in. was strange too, like chrysanthemums that had stayed too long on the stalks and rotted in the frost. Motte came at eleven to prepare the roast pork from the salted sow that they had slaughtered in the autumn. The She was still strong, far more than her sons. Hermann would crouch beside her bed trying to break her otherworldly butcher had come from the village to do the killing. concentration talking to her, then abuse of the foulest that his young imagination could discover. He would take They worked all day transforming the affectionate waddling pet into the sausage and smoking hams that hung in the hatpin from her Sunday bonnet and prick her arm. She would flay out one powerful arm at the offending hurt. the cellar. Once or twice she connected the most devastating blow that sent Hermann reeling into the wall winding him for At midday Jule the Father and his two eldest sons Lucien and Julien would scrape their boots and sit to roasted many minutes. pork with potatoes, dry and salty, that kept them working until sunset. When she died, her husband dug the grave at the end of the furthermost field. He then returned to the house and When the Father had finished his work for the day he went to his wife and lifted her gently from the bed. Folded lifted her for the final time into the sidecart. He did not go directly to the burial site. He followed their usual route in woolen wraps. Her mad arms were coiled around his tired neck. She would whimper with delight as he carried around the fields, speaking to her as he always did. He made the journey as long as he could, covering the same her outside to the vehicle… an old Sonrite motorbike with a sidecar and window flaps that clapped in the wind. ground over and over, he did not want to give her up. The sons watched as the Father drove around the pasture… He placed her in the sidecar and she nestled there waiting for him to warm the engine. Around the yard and out then all of a sudden he accelerated… sped up and down mowing up the new spring grasses, skidding in the wet past the smokehouse. The hens would fly in a panic to the lower branches of the cherry tree and into the hedge that earth and the children grew afraid of him. He stopped and bundled her up in his arms, she was a massive woman. boarded the chicken coop. Out onto the pasture field they would fly and he would talk to her in the mutterings Hermann thought he heard her whisper of pleasure. The man lifted her into the hole and shoveled the earth in on that no one else had a mind to overhear. She stared ahead, whimpering with pleasure until he again rounded his top of her. He was a practical man and knew when to stop the foolishness. back and slowed to a spluttering halt at the red door. She always looked at him sadly, not wanting to go back to the pillows… at times he could not stand that sadness and would once more take her out to the pasture and her whine shredded the air like a fierce wind that frightened him. Each time they returned from this flight they both looked overcome… transparent faces, the skin stretched taut from the bracing wind. Quote of the Month Silent and orgasmic. During this most privileged of madnesses, in the last phase of her life, she became pregnant. It was shocking to Can anything be more absurd than keeping women in a state of ignorance, and yet so vehemently to insist on their resisting temptation? many that this oafish woman had still played hostess to an old man’s immodest attentions. More so, she was well beyond the age of childbearing. Vicesimus Knox (1752-1821) British essayist. Her body swelled and she lay there waiting to be taken on her ride, vacant to all else. Liberal Education, Vol 1 ‘On the Literary Education of Women’ This son, Hermann, was born on the same night as a calf and the farmer went from bed to barn administering his midwifery skills, tying the calf’s legs together when they first appeared from the mother’s body, and hauling it into the straw, while the cow bellowed and licked his arms. The woman gave birth shuddering in the despair and fury of a great hurt. She looked around the bloody bed to see what could have caused the pain.

10 Write Away November 2014 Newsletter of the Society of Women Writers Victoria 11 Frock Horror Virginia Woolf: On Keeping a Diary

Lynn Smailes In an entry dated 20th April, 1919, Virginia Woolf describes the advantages of keeping a diary.

I’d done everything I could. I visualised, I used self-talk. I established the time the factory outlet opened on Monday. Some background is needed here: I spent a chunk of Friday slipping surreptitiously into formal and party-wear shops, peeking at labels. Six hundred for a dress that probably won’t fit — this happens when you are 30 in your brain and 60 something in your body. Seven hundred for an ensemble in my favourite colour — this happens at the age when you delude yourself that colour can compensate for the deficiencies of a style or physique. It was the price tag of fifteen hundred for the deep claret coloured suit with the flattering neckline and delicate lace overlay that sent me in search of comfort food. This happens often. When you calculate that your multifocal spectacles cost a bomb they’re good value, given the amount of wear they will see, if you’ll pardon the pun. On the other hand, set against the number of times it will be worn, a formal outfit is a poor superannuation investment. My sister-in-law told me about the factory outlet when I was whining about my plight. ‘Mmmm,’ she said, ‘they have those brands much cheaper at the factory shop.’ Jude is one of those women who is always well turned out, even when exercising. She is no stick insect, but her hair is well groomed without being helmetised, her nails polished and shaped. All traces of the loving relationship she has with her pets are excised from her clothes before she ventures out. When she heads off for the races, complete with hat, bag and in outfits either new or great quality staples tweaked into several incarnations, Jude looks sartorially splendid. I peered through the window before I entered the factory. There were racks crammed with garments in a I got out this diary and read, as one always does read one’s own writing, with a kind of guilty intensity. I confess that range of sizes to fit normal people, a goodly selection of sizes 14, 16, 18 and above. The shop assistant was the rough and random style of it, often so ungrammatical, and crying for a word altered, afflicted me somewhat. welcoming without being pushy, making casual conversation, assessing how much assistance was appropriate I am trying to tell whichever self it is that reads this hereafter that I can write very much better; and take no time against how much I would accept. I told her what I wanted and she told me how she had come to work over this; and forbid her to let the eye of man behold it. And now I may add my little compliment to the effect there. She had been looking for an outfit for a wedding and baulked at the prices in Sydney Road’s wedding that it has a slapdash and vigour and sometimes hits an unexpected bull’s eye. But what is more to the point is my strip, just as I had. Someone told her about the outlet and after several successful shopping expeditions, she belief that the habit of writing thus for my own eye only is good practice. It loosens the ligaments. Never mind the was offered a job. misses and the stumbles. Going at such a pace as I do I must make the most direct and instant shots at my object, and thus have to lay hands on words, choose them and shoot them with no more pause than is needed to put my We selected a range of outfits for trying on: a slinky silk top with a beautiful drape; a smart pewter dress pen in the ink. I believe that during the past year I can trace some increase of ease in my professional writing which with a lace jacket; a carmine frock overlaid with lace; a smart black dress with a gold lace bodice falling from I attribute to my casual half hours after tea. Moreover there looms ahead of me the shadow of some kind of form the shoulders to just below the waist; and a soft ruffled purple gown. The slinky silk slunk off my narrow which a diary might attain to. I might in the course of time learn what it is that one can make of this loose, drifting shoulders and I thought the smart pewter dress looked okay until the assistant suggested it would look better material of life; finding another use for it than the use I put it to, so much more consciously and scrupulously, in when I was wearing my good bra and foundation garments. From the startled look I gave her, she guessed fiction. What sort of diary should I like mine to be? Something loose knit and yet not slovenly, so elastic that it will I was wearing my good bra, and that foundation garments and I parted company permanently when panty embrace anything, solemn, slight or beautiful that comes into my mind. I should like it to resemble some deep old hose were invented. When I stepped into the carmine number I felt like I was drowning in the layers of a desk, or capacious hold-all, in which one flings a mass of odds and ends without looking them through. I should cunningly-disguised carnivorous wedding cake and she was diplomatic when I was unable to ease the smart like to come back, after a year or two, and find that the collection had sorted itself and refined itself and coalesced, black dress over my hips. It was the soft, ruffled gown in my favourite colour that won out; it skims my as such deposits so mysteriously do, into a mould, transparent enough to reflect the light of our life, and yet steady, body loosely enough that my good bra will be good enough. I saved the one hundred and fifty dollars I may tranquil compounds with the aloofness of a work of art. The main requisite, I think on re-reading my old volumes, have otherwise spent on a body suit that would have suffocated me and hey! maybe, just maybe, I will put a is not to play the part of censor, but to write as the mood comes or of anything whatever; since I was curious to downpayment on some multifocals to match. find how I went for things put in haphazard, and found the significance to lie where I never saw it at the time. But Damn, forgot about the shoes. looseness quickly becomes slovenly. A little effort is needed to face a character or an incident which needs to be recorded. Nor can one let the pen write without guidance; for fear of becoming slack and untidy...

Extract from A Writer’s Diary by Virginia Woolf, preface by Lyndall Gordon, published by Persephone Books, 1953. ISBN: 9781 9031 55 882

12 Write Away November 2014 Newsletter of the Society of Women Writers Victoria 13 Annual Postal Workshop Picnic Competitions The annual postal workshop picnic will be held in the Fitzroy Gardens on SATURDAY 17TH JANUARY 2015. Members will meet at the restaurant at 11 am. If members sit inside the restaurant it is appropriate to purchasefood Compiled by Louise Davenport and drinks from the venue. Outside or near the restaurant members may choose to bring their own food and Positive Words Mini Competitions Reader’s Digest 100-Word Story The prize is $500 and the entry fee is drinks. If the forecast temperature for Melbourne, is 38 degrees or above, the picnic will be cancelled. Closing 30 November & 31 December Closing 31 December $20. Entrants must submit a hard copy RSVP: Invitation to Launch: Blood Plums by Lorraine McGuigan Monthly themes, post entries by the last For a short story of 100 words open to and an electronic copy of their work. day of the month. November entries Australian residents 18 and over. First www.fortysouth.com.au To be launched by Ross Gillett. must contain the word LAUGHTER prize is $1000 and two runners-up will Eaglehawk Dahlia and Arts Festival • Where: Art Gallery of Ballarat Annex, Ballarat, Victoria and the word for December is TRAVEL. receive $250. Enter online. Free. Inc. Literary Competition • Date: Saturday December 13. Short stories of 100 words and poetry www.readersdigest.com.au Closing Date: 14 February 2015 of 10 lines. Entry fee is $1.80 in unused • Time: 2.30 for 3.00 to 5 pm Carnival of Flowers Entries cost $5. Winners of the The stamps. The Editor, Sandra James, PO One-Act Playwriting Competition Rolf Boldrewood Short Story Prize Catering: cheese platters and sandwich style, tea and coffee, soft drinks. Box 798, Heathcote, Victoria 3523. Closing 31 January 2015 for a story of 3000 words and the RSVP: Barry Breen at [email protected] Prizes: 6 months subscription to Positive A prize for a one-act play of 30–45 Apollo Poetry Award for a poem of Words. minutes and ‘10 minute bump in/ 30 lines will receive $200 for first and Vale: Helen Lewkowich Blackened Billy Verse Competition out’. The entry fee is $30 (postal $50 for second. The prize for the Alan Another piece of sad news for the members of the SWWV — we have lost our member Helen Lewkowich — Closing 30 November entry). First prize is $2000, second Llewellyn Bush Verse Award for a poem who passed away on 20 August 2014. Celebrating 25 Years! Organised by is $1200 and third is $800. Check of 52 lines on an Australian theme is Tamworth Poetry Reading Group. conditions, staging requirements at $100 or $50 for second place. Helen was a gifted writer. She wrote many short stories based on her wartime experiences and several of them Sponsored by Australian Bush Poets www.toowoombarepertorytheatre. Details: The Literary Competition, Ruth were published in anthologies. Association. The first prize is the com.au/ Claridge, 99 Victoria St Eaglehawk 3556, During the past few years, the poor state of her health prevented Helen from taking an active part in the Society’s Blackened Billy Trophy and $600, E J Brady Short Story Competition [email protected], activities. However, until recently, she was interested in everything concerning our Society. She enjoyed reading second prize is $300 and third is $200. Closing 31 January 2015 www.eaglehawkfestival.org.au Write Away and asked for news about our members. All prizes come with certificates. Entry: A competition for a very short story Laura Literary Awards Helen had friends in Australia and around the world. Her warm personality attracted people to her and she’ll be $5 or 5 for $20. Send a business-sized of 700 words (the Gabo Prize) and Closing Date: 20 February 2015 self-addressed stamped envelope for an sadly missed. for a longer short story of 2500 words Open themed competitions for adults entry form to The Blackened Billy Verse (the Mallacoota Prize). Entry fee is $8 and children. Adult categories (poem of Anna Sput-Stern Competition, PO Box 3001, West (online) and $10 if posted. The prize for 60 lines and/or a short story to 1500 Tamworth, NSW, 2340 or download the very short story is $500. First prize words) costs $10 to enter and the Cher Chidzey from www.abpa.org.au/events for the longer story is $2000, second is winners receive $200. The young adult, Cher Chidzey was an extra in the short film Courage, that has been accepted by the Made in Melbourne Film The Ron Pretty Poetry Prize $300, plus $100 encouragement award. junior and junior primary sections are Festival to be screened at the Revolt Art Space, 12 Elizabeth St, Kensington on 30th November, 7:30 pm. Closing 30 November www.artsmallacoota.org/page10 free to enter, and are for poetry of 60 Tickets are available through Moshtix given in the link below. The prize for this award is $5,000 and Eyre Writers Literary Awards lines, and short stories of 1500, 1000, http://www.mim.org.au/program.html is open to entrants 18 years and over. It Closing 31 January 2015 and 500 words (respectively). Prizes is a competition for poetry of 30 lines. Prizes of $200, plus a trophy are offered range from $50 for young adults to $15 Ailsa Barr Entry fee is $20 ($10 for additional in each category of this competition. for junior primary. entries). Online entry only. www. www.rockyriverriters.webs.com/ Ailsa Barr has moved to Tasmania to be with her family. She said she has enjoyed more than 40 years with the Fees are $5 per entry. fiveislandspress.com competitions Society of Women Writers Victoria, and gained inspiration and fine friendships from those she knew. Ailsa’s new The Typical Australia Prize is for a work The Joanne Burns Micro-Lit Award of prose of 1500 words (fiction, non- The John O’Brien Literary Awards address can be provided to members who would like to contact her. Closing 21 December fiction, essay or memoir) written on Closing 27 February 2015 This is a competition for a short story of a sea or land theme. The non-themed These awards are open to Australians New Members: Welcome to Lynn Smailes. 200 words on the theme ‘Dislocation’, competitions are the Tom Black over the age of 18 years for a short open to Australian citizens/permanent Memorial Prize for rhyming poetry of story of 1000–2000 words or poetry Opportunities residents over 18. The prize is $300. 50 lines, a short story prize for work of of 48 lines on the theme ‘100 years Entry: $7 (online entries only). www. 1500 words and a non-rhyming poetry of ANZAC’. Entry fee is $10 and the shortaustralianstories.com.au award for a poem of 50 lines. Details: prize for each category is $200. Enter Pulse Radio 94.7 FM The Griffin Award Competition Secretary, PO Box 1771, by post. Closing 31 December Port Lincoln, SA 5606 Details: John O’Brien Writing John Reid’s Don’t forget invitation to have your poems read on the Poetry with John Reid program on Geelong’s Offers $10,000 for a play of 60 www.eyrewriters.com Competition, Narrandera Visitor Pulse Radio 94.7 FM. Send poems to John Reid, Pulse Radio 94.7, 68–70 Little Ryrie St, Geelong, Vic, 3220 or minutes written by a citizen/ Forty South Publishing Tasmanian Centre, PO Box 89, Narrandera, 2700, email [email protected]. permanent resident who has not Writers’ Prize [email protected]. au or www.johnobrien.org.au/open- won or been shortlisted for another Closing 31 January 2015 writing-competition-guidelines/ Escape Publishing seeks romance short stories (5,000–10,000 words) and novels in all sub-categories for e-books. Australian playwriting competition. Open to all, this competition is for a Four runners-up will receive $1000. Guidelines on http://www.escapepublishing.com.au/submissionsguidelines. Within two weeks of submission, story of 3000 words on a ‘Island or No entry fee, online entry only. Island-resonant’ theme. an editor usually provides a short crit on all material submitted. www.griffintheatre.com.au 14 Write Away November 2014 Newsletter of the Society of Women Writers Victoria 15 NOTICE

Society of Women Writers Victoria, Friday, 28th November

The Christmas Meeting begins 10 am, Sue Healy Room, Mezzanine Floor, 28th November! Note changes to the way the Christmas Competition is run! One entry per person. It can be a short, short story (one & a half A4 pages) reading time limit 3 minutes, or a poem, reading time 3 minutes. Author reads her work or can designate another to read, the audience (consisting of other authors and bystanders) gives points for each work presented. At the finish the points are tallied and three mystery prizes awarded. The theme is ‘Christmas’.

The Society of Women Writers POSTAGE Victoria Inc. If undeliverable return to: Surface Mail PAID 73 Church Road, AUSTRALIA Carrum VIC 3197 PP 381712/02477

Society of Women Writers Victoria Inc. Reg. No. A0039632B Yearly Subscription: $35 Fee for Postal Workshop: $10 Door Fee: $5

Name:

Address:

Phone: Email:

Would you like to receive your newsletter via email: Yes No Payment Methods: BY MAIL: Send this slip with a cheque or money order to SWWV to The Treasurer, Shirley Whiteway, 78 Abbott Street, Sandringham, 3191. IN PERSON: Hand this slip and exact money in an envelope to the Treasurer or Secretary.