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MELBOURNE WRITERS FESTIVAL DIGITAL 7 A U G U S T – 16 AUGUST MWF.COM.AU #MWFDIGITAL WELCOME In what meaningful and transformative how we connect with each other and our environment and, importantly, they will ways do we attend to the issues celebrate their books and writing that hold of our time? A perennial question our attention despite the world in which we asked throughout history by all who find ourselves. pay attention to the world. Recent Brimming with heart, intellect and curiosity, events have bluntly highlighted that I hope this Festival is the celebration and We respectfully acknowledge that today’s concerns – the climate crisis, refuge you need. globalisation and capitalism, and racial, I hope that it captures your attention. Melbourne Writers Festival is created on cultural and economic inequity – are See you soon. the traditional lands of the Kulin Nation, all connected. To paraphrase Martin Gene Smith in particular the Wurundjeri and Boon Luther King Jr: injustice anywhere, Associate Director injustice everywhere. Wurrung people. We pay our respects Frustratingly, the conversations we’re having today about these problems are the same to Elders past, present and emerging. that were had decades ago. Jenny Odell, a guest at this year’s Festival, challenges us on this notion of repetition by declaring: ‘if you were reading a book whose pages began to seem more and more similar, until you were reading the same page over and over again, you would put that book down.’ Another SMITH perennial question: when we’re not happy with the circumstances of yesterday and today, what can we do to change those of tomorrow? Which book do we pick up next? To help you decide, this August more than 100 of the world’s most perspicacious writers GENE and thinkers will converge under the banner of the Festival’s theme, Attention. Through its lens, they will question who we give our attention to and why, unpack how crises and other major events force us to reconsider 2 MWF.COM.AU #MWFDIGITAL 3 7 & 8 AUGUST 8 AUGUST FINDING THE HEART KATE WRIGHT EVELYN OF THE NATION GRENVILLE ARALUEN FRI 7 AUG, 7–8 PM ‘When you read this book, you will be feeling the pulse of this beautiful country, Australia.’ The Uluru Statement, created in 2017, is a rallying cry to enshrine First Nations’ voices in the Australian Constitution. Torres Strait LAWRENCE Islander writer Thomas Mayor spent 18 months travelling across the country to garner support for the Statement – now, with Finding the Heart of the Nation, Mayor brings that journey to all Australians. Mayor is joined by academic Megan Davis and lawyer Teela Reid to discuss what THE OUTSET: DO NOT LAWRENCE WRIGHT: MEDITATIONS IN Black Lives Matter should mean in a land wrought by colonisation and in which First BELIEVE TOO QUICKLY THE END OF OCTOBER AN EMERGENCY Nations’ sovereignty was never ceded, and SAT 8 AUG SAT 8 AUG, 10–11 AM SAT 8 AUG, 11AM – 12PM PODCAST the vital importance of the Uluru Statement ‘Now, as I read the papers and watch the In his 1954 poem ‘Meditations in an in the fight for Indigenous rights. Stories are our survival and our delight. news, I have that same unsettled sensation Emergency’, Frank O’Hara declared, with Supported by Australian Communities They carve a path through the confusion of revisiting scenes that I have already ambiguous irony, ‘Destroy yourself, if you Foundation of unprecedented times. But behind each written.’ don’t know!’ story that’s told stands another, silenced When Lawrence Wright wrote The End of Join Evelyn Araluen, Toby Fitch, Ursula one. How can we attend to those unheard October – in which a deadly virus works its Robinson-Shaw and Darlene Silva truths and reach a more nuanced way around the world, leaving economic Soberano for poetic performances understanding of our past and the present? M AYOR meltdown, conspiracy theories, and mass responding to the increasingly precarious In the Festival’s opening address, acclaimed death in its wake – he understood that such state of the world, and a tribute to the late, author Kate Grenville (A Room Made of a disaster was a possibility. But he had no radical poet, Sean Bonney (1969–2019), Leaves) considers truth, fiction and the idea it would be realised so soon. whose final book Our Death is a work of stories that urgently need our attention. Here, the author and New Yorker staff writer radiant fury, lament and refusal. sits down to discuss his brilliant and In partnership with Australian Poetry THOMAS all-too-prescient novel. With Claire Nichols. 4 MWF.COM.AU #MWFDIGITAL 5 8 AUGUST 8 AUGUST ADLER JOSHI BECKY AFTER MANAWATU AUSTRALIA PAUL SAT 8 AUG, 2–3 PM In this daring collection of speculative KETAN fiction, 12 Indigenous writers and writers of colour offer up visions of Australia’s possible futures: after colonisation, after white supremacy, and after climate change. Authors Claire G Coleman and Omar Sakr sit down with After Australia editor Michael Mohammed Ahmad to discuss their contributions and the broader aims of this THE FIFTH ESTATE: bold, provocative and galvanising anthology. BECKY MANAWATU: THE FUTURE OF A MATTER SOCIALISM AUĒ SAT 8 AUG, 12–1 PM OF FACT SAT 8 AUG, 5–6 PM SAT 8 AUG, 4–5 PM ‘Democratic socialism is not a leap into the ‘I hadn’t said a word in so long because I was As certain branches across politics and the unknown. Capitalist industry has built the afraid of how I’d sound. I hoped it would stop media push mistruths, half-truths and lies foundations for a world beyond capitalism him, me not talking. Worry him a bit. But about the cause and severity of the climate and its crises.’ even when I didn’t say goodbye, he left.’ crisis in Australia, identifying reliable, In The 99 Percent Economy: How science-backed information is increasingly Written by Ngāi Tahu author and journalist Democratic Socialism Can Overcome the G COLEMAN a challenge. Becky Manawatu, Auē is a work of gritty, Crises of Capitalism, Paul Adler argues social realist fiction centring on the lives of But how do we identify misinformation in that the only way to save society from orphaned brothers: eight-year-old Arama the battle against climate change, and what catastrophic collapse is to adopt and teenager Taukiri. can we do to counter it? Academic Judith democratic socialism. Brett (The Coal Curse) and renewable Dealing with themes of domestic violence, Adler joins Sally Warhaft for a discussion CLAIRE energy expert Ketan Joshi (Windfall) join gang culture, curdled masculinity and that elucidates how our current economy Graham Readfearn in conversation. fractured families, this award-winning debut serves about one per cent of the world from a uniquely New Zealand voice Supported by the Department of population, why it barely works for the rest captures remarkable insights into the minds Environment, Land, Water and Planning of us, and what we can do to change it – of children and young men. Join Manawatu before it’s too late. in conversation with Tara June Winch. In partnership with the Wheeler Centre 6 MWF.COM.AU #MWFDIGITAL 7 8 AUGUST 9 AUGUST CHARLOTTE KEVIN HANNAN SOPHIE MCCONAGHY: THE K WA N M C LAST MIGRATION NEILL SAT 8 AUG, 7–8 PM ‘The animals are dying. Soon we will be alone here.’ VICTORIA The highly anticipated The Last Migration is a haunting love letter to the natural world, to the wild places and creatures threatened by climate change. It’s also a profoundly observed story of one young woman’s quest to bear witness to the migration of the world’s last remaining flock of Arctic terns. Join author Charlotte McConaghy for an insight into what has been hailed as VICTORIA HANNAN: ‘an astounding meditation on love, trauma, KEVIN KOKOMO WE CAN’T and the cost of survival’. With Nadia Bailey. SUN 9 AUG, 10–11 AM KWAN: ‘She wanted to be taken apart and put back SAY WE together, a kettle filled, boiled, emptied and SEX AND refilled again.’ DIDN’T Winner of the 2019 Victorian Premier’s VANITY Literary Award for an unpublished KNOW SAT 8 AUG, 8–9 PM manuscript, Kokomo is the superbly written SUN 9 AUG, 11AM – 12PM debut from Melbourne-based author MCCONAGHY ‘It looks like a Versace dress exploded all Victoria Hannan. We Can’t Say We Didn’t Know bears witness over my room.’ to human stories of devastation and hope Described as ‘a disarmingly profound novel from civilians – the children, families, Crazy Rich Asians author Kevin Kwan is about the violence and the softness of back with an intoxicating new story of love, refugees, doctors, dissidents, and asylum navigating the world as a young woman’, seekers – who are the collateral damage in lust, and the impossibly gilded lives of the Kokomo is both tender and fierce, elite, that flits from the sun-drenched isle the relentless politicking and war-mongering heartbreaking and funny, and announces of nations. of Capri to the grandeur of the Hamptons. a brilliant new voice in Australian fiction. Sex and Vanity is both escapist love story With Ronnie Scott. Challenging us not to look away, Walkley CHARLOTTE and a witty exploration of Asian-American award-winning journalist Sophie McNeill identity. Join Kwan for a lively discussion confronts the horrors of an unsettled world on fame, fiction, and the Crazy Rich Asians and calls not for hope – but for courage. phenomenon. With Beverley Wang. With Sami Shah. In collaboration with PEN Melbourne 8 MWF.COM.AU #MWFDIGITAL 9 9 AUGUST 9 AUGUST JESSIE TU: ROBBIE JING-JING LEE: YUMNA A LONELY GIRL IS A ARNOTT HOW WE DISAPPEARED KASSAB DANGEROUS THING SUN 9 AUG, 4–5 PM SUN 9 AUG, 12–1 PM ‘He’d brought it up one day at home, was ‘No one here tonight will write about my beginning to tell Wang Di what happened work with the seriousness given to a man.