Finalist Exhibition 13 – 27 November 2006 Federation Square

Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 finalists John Marsden Dorothy Porter Hannie Rayson

Best Writing Award finalists Azhar Abidi Ben Chessell Neil Grant Sonya Hartnett Mary Ellen Jordan David McCooey Ross Mueller Carrie Tiffany Christos Tsiolkas Henry von Doussa The Melbourne Prize The exhibition of finalists for Literature 2006 will be held in the Atrium at catalogue provides a Federation Square between review of the finalists 13 – 27 November 2006. for the following awards: Further information on / Melbourne Prize the Melbourne Prize Trust for Literature 2006 and Melbourne Prize for / Best Writing Award Literature 2006 please visit www.melbourneprizetrust.org or call 03 9650 8800

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Professional Services Media Communications Print Partner Exhibition Consultants Coleby Consulting Dion Hall Web Development littleirrepressiblewonton.com The Melbourne Prize Trust is delighted with the strong response to the Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006. The prize, made possible by the generous support of our partners and patrons, recognises and rewards literary excellence and creativity. Demonstrating the value we place on our creative resources, the prize assists in positioning Melbourne and Victoria as a centre of great writing and opportunity for writers and provides the public with access to the wealth and diversity of talent we have in this state. Simon H Warrender Executive Director & Founder Melbourne Prize Trust

0 Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006

A cornerstone of a vibrant and The City of Melbourne is a proud The Melbourne Prize is unique healthy economy and community supporter of the Melbourne Prize amongst Australian literary prizes, is creativity, in all its forms, across for Literature 2006. The response not only for its generosity but varied sectors. The Committee to this year’s prize is evidence also for its acknowledgement for Melbourne is proud to be a of the literary talent we have of the careers and contributions founding partner of the annual in our community. The calibre of Victoria’s writers and for Melbourne Prize as it fosters of the shortlist, in both prize its recognition of our younger the development of our creative categories, demonstrates the writers. It has been a great resources and demonstrates strength and diversity of our pleasure and privilege to be the value we place on talent and writers and reinforces Melbourne part of the Melbourne Prize. creative excellence. This year and Victoria’s reputation as the I’ve reacquainted myself with the quantity and quality of the cultural capital of Australia. the works of some of my favourite response to the Melbourne Prize Lord Mayor John So writers and discovered some for Literature 2006, which is City of Melbourne wonderful new writers and their the most valuable literary prize works. The only drawback about in Australia, is evidence of The Melbourne Prize for Literature the prize is that there can only the abundant writing talent 2006 and the Best Writing Award, be two winners. All the writers we have in Victoria and firmly unlike other Australian prizes, we shortlisted have made such reinforces our position as a are across genres and media. wonderful contributions and there major cultural capital. This makes judging rather a were many writers and works that Janine Kirk AM challenge but our reading and aren’t in the shortlist that also Executive Director discussions over the shortlists demonstrate the richness of Committee for Melbourne were hugely enjoyable. The Victoria’s literary culture. I would Director established writers we had to like to congratulate them all and Melbourne Prize Trust choose between are all great of course the Melbourne Prize talents whose work is essential Trust and its sponsors for this I found the experience of judging reading. The shortlisted writers wonderful initiative. this rich and innovative prize for the Best Writing Award ranged Mark Rubbo OAM challenging, interesting and widely and reassured us that Awarding Committee member rewarding. The imaginative and highly original and risk-taking Managing Director formal diversity of entries across work has not gone away. Readings Books Music Film the two divisions of the prize, the quality of much of the writing, The Melbourne Prize for Literature the confidence and willingness to 2006 is one of those generous take risks among the Best Writing initiatives that doesn’t happen entrants and the sheer class and often enough. This one, with the substance of the established potential to grow into a major writers were all cause for great national and then international satisfaction and excitement in award, will make its mark for sure. these times when our literary Hilary McPhee AO culture so often has to struggle Awarding Committee member in a philistine social and political environment. All in all, a wonderful undertaking splendidly administered and conducted by the Melbourne Prize Trust. Professor Brian Matthews Awarding Committee member 0 The Best Writing Award finalists Sure, I remember where I was My thanks to the Melbourne represent a lively cross-section when Harold Holt drowned, and Prize for boosting the recognition of writing styles and genres, watching Cathy Freeman’s lap of paid to our homegrown (and world from works of non-fiction to honour (draped in red, black and class) literary talent. These two plays, poetry to novels. Age gold), and marvelling at pictures prizes have given us an opportunity notwithstanding, that shortlist of Rachel Griffiths protesting to celebrate and investigate a includes some of Australia’s most topless at Crown Casino’s launch. wide variety of literary creation adept writers. The shortlist for the But when I recall first reading sometimes divided by form, age, Melbourne Prize for Literature Porter’s Akhenaten, or Garner’s experience, content and style. 2006 is also incredibly substantial, , and falling headlong Despite the difficulties in judging having been drawn from a complete into Rayson’s world at Theatreworks, across (sometimes) arbitrary list of some of Australia’s Most I not only remember where I was, divides, the shortlists (and those Wanted Writers. It is a credit to but who I was. Just as these artists left off them) well reflect the talent our literary culture that the task have continued to, now perhaps that originates in Victoria. We are of narrowing them down was so it’s also Hartnett’s Surrender or lucky to have fostered such a range tricky, and it’s an absolute delight Tsiolkas’ Dead Europe which will of writers in the past, and with the to have such gratifyingly meaty watermark the me of now. The Best Writing Award I hope that lists the first year of the prize. joy of reading for the Melbourne we can continue to support and Louise Swinn Prize was being reminded just promote those who represent the Advisory Group member how indebted I am to these writers future. Indeed, it’s been a pleasure Editorial Director for my very self-possession, and to be part of a prize that recognises, Sleepers Publishing to know the award gives thanks celebrates and promotes writers on behalf of us all. who are at both stages of their career, and these prizes have By any estimation Victoria is Stephen Armstrong Advisory Group member made me hopeful that we’ve bursting at the seams with writers from all generations who writing talent. The quality of Executive Producer Malthouse Theatre are willing to challenge the way entrants for the Melbourne Prize we view ourselves. for Literature 2006 in particular was outstanding - it was a Steve Grimwade challenge, albeit a wonderful one, Advisory Group member to compare and rate writers of Director such experience and diversity. The Emerging Writers Festival entrants for the Best Writing Award Program Manager represent the future of our literary Victorian Writers Centre culture and in this regard there is much cause for celebration. All ten shortlistees excel in their chosen media and are producing works that are by turns daring, original and accomplished. Congratulations should also go to the Melbourne Prize Trust for their commitment to fostering and promoting those individuals whose artistic endeavours enrich our lives. Rod Morrison Advisory Group member Associate Publisher Hardie Grant Books 0 Helen Garner Finalist – Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: an outstanding contribution, by a Victorian writer, to and to cultural and intellectual life.

Helen Garner, who was born in Geelong Published Works in 1942, is one of Australia’s finest writers. She has been publishing novels, short stories, Monkey Grip non-fiction and journalism since 1977 when her first novel,Monkey Grip, became an Honour & Other instant bestseller. Then came Honour & People’s Children Other People’s Children, which established Helen Garner as a realist with remarkable The Children’s Bach powers of observation. Subsequent works include the stories Postcards from Surfers and the collected stories My Hard Heart, and the novels The Children’s Bach Cosmo Cosmolino and Cosmo Cosmolino, as well as the screenplays for the feature filmThe Last The Last Days of Days of Chez Nous and Jane Campion’s TV drama Two Friends. Chez Nous (screenplay) Helen Garner’s non-fiction works include the Two Friends widely-debated and controversial , published in 1995; True Stories; (screenplay) , a collection of her journalism and essays; and more recently Joe Cinque’s The First Stone Consolation - about the killing of Joe Cinque, and the trials of the two young women who True Stories were charged with his murder. My Hard Heart The Feel of Steel Joe Cinque’s Consolation

0 John Marsden Finalist – Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: an outstanding contribution, by a Victorian writer, to Australian literature and to cultural and intellectual life.

John Marsden’s life recently took a new Published Works Norton’s Hut turn when he established a small alternative school just outside of Melbourne. So Much to Tell You Marsden on Marsden Candelbark School, with 75 students, embodies John’s commitment to education The Journey Winter that is imaginative, lively, spirited and invigorating. He has applied the same The Great Gatenby The Head Book principles to his writing, which is now read avidly around the world, but never more Staying Alive in Year 5 The Boy You eagerly than in Australia, where his sales Brought Home have passed two million. Out of Time Recently John became only the fifth author Letters from the Inside Millie to receive the prestigious Lloyd O’Neil Award. He joins Ruth Park, Tom Keneally, Morris West Take My Word for It A Roomful of Magic and . Looking for Trouble This I Believe (ed.) Cool School I Believe This (ed.) Creep Street The Tomorrow Series Checkers Tomorrow, When the War Began For Weddings and a Funeral (ed.) The Dead of the Night Dear Miffy The Third Day, the Frost Prayer for the Darkness, By My Friend 21st Century Burning for Revenge Everything I Know The Night is for Hunting About Writing The Other Side of Dawn Secret Men’s Business The Ellie Chronicles So Much to While I Live Tell You: the Play Incurable The Magic Rainforest Circle of Flight A Day in the Life of Me The Rabbits

0 Alex Miller Finalist – Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: an outstanding contribution, by a Victorian writer, to Australian literature and to cultural and intellectual life.

Alex Miller is one of Australia’s best Published Works Essays and Short Stories loved novelists. He has twice won the Novels and is an overall Prophets of the Imagination winner of the Commonwealth Writers Prize. Prochownik’s Dream He is the author of seven major literary Sweet Water works, a number of which have been Journey to the published in the UK and the USA, and all From the Other Side – of which are currently in print in Australia. Stone Country A Patient’s Perspective His most recent novel is the critically acclaimed Prochownik’s Dream Conditions of Faith The Wine Merchant (Allen & Unwin 2005) The Sitters of Aarhus Photo courtesy of Theodore Halacas The Ancestor Game Why I’m Falling in Love The Tivington Nott with Madame du Terre Watching the Climbers Impressions of China on the Mountain My First Love Rollover The Limits of Democracy Chinese Connections and Disconnections Modern, European and Novel This is How ‘it’s’ Going to Be Then How to Kill Wild Horses Comrade Pawel

Plays Getting Back to What Armageddon is Next Wednesday Exiles Kitty Howard

0 Dorothy Porter Finalist – Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: an outstanding contribution, by a Victorian writer, to Australian literature and to cultural and intellectual life.

Dorothy Porter has published twelve books, Published Works including six collections of poetry, two novels Verse Novels for young adults and four verse novels. Her verse novels, What a Piece of Work Akhenaten and Wild Surmise, were shortlisted for Australia’s premier award for fiction, the Miles The Monkey’s Mask Franklin Award, in 2000 and 2003 respectively. Wild Surmise was awarded the Adelaide What a Piece of Work Festival 2004 John Bray Award for Poetry as well as the overall Premier’s Award – Wild Surmise the first time this award has been given Poetry to a book of poetry. Her bestselling crime thriller in verse, Little Hoodlum The Monkey’s Mask, has been adapted for the stage and radio, and was released Bison internationally as a film in 2001 starring Kelly McGillis and Susie Porter. The Night Parrot Dorothy Porter has also written two opera Driving Too Fast libretti with composer Jonathan Mills. Their most recent chamber opera, The Eternity Crete Man, was a joint winner of the inaugural Genesis Foundation opera award in London Other Worlds 2004, and had its international premiere at the Almeida Theatre. Its Australian premiere Young Adult Fiction was at the Opera House for the 2005 Sydney Festival. Rookwood In July 2005 a double CD, Before Time The Witch Number Could Change Us, a collection of love songs written by Dorothy Porter for composer and sung by celebrated singer , was released by Warner Records. It won the Aria (Australia’s major music awards) for Best Jazz Album of 2005. Dorothy Porter’s new verse novel, El Dorado, will be published by Picador in 2007.

0 Hannie Rayson Finalist – Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: an outstanding contribution, by a Victorian writer, to Australian literature and to cultural and intellectual life.

Hannie Rayson is a major Australian writer Published Works with a strong international profile. Her work has been performed in every capital city of Mary Australia by major theatre companies. Her plays have been produced at The National Room to Move Theatre of Tokyo, The Duchess in London’s West End, The National Theatre of Slovenia, Hotel Sorrento The Centaur in Montreal, The Orange Tree in London, The English Speaking Theatres of Falling from Grace Vienna and Frankfurt and The Helsinki City Scenes from a Separation Theatre, Finland. She was one of six Australian playwrights to have works given a performed Competitive Tenderness reading by the Comedie-Francais in Paris. Hannie Rayson is the recipient of many Life after George prestigious awards including The Premier’s Literary Award for Drama in Victoria and New Inheritance South Wales, The Helpmann Awards, the AWGIES (Australian Writer’s Guild Award), Two Brothers The Age Performing Arts Award, The Sidney Myer Performing Arts Award, and Melbourne Green Room Awards. She was also nominated for The Miles Franklin and awarded The Magazine Publisher’s Award for columnist of the year. Hannie Rayson is a regular contributor to various magazines and publications.

0 D.H. Lawrence once remarked that if you tried to nail the novel down it would get up and run away with the nail. Despite the murmurings of some critics, he was right, because we continue to tell our stories. Some we make up, some we’ve remembered, some we research, others we’ve heard about. ‘Story’ – whether ‘true’ or imagined – won’t lie down, and it resists all attempts to silence it, because it is in crafted narratives that the imagination works on real life and the human heart in ways that reveal truths, possibilities, joys and evils not otherwise available. And so, honouring, rewarding and valuing our writers of fiction and non-fiction, our dramatists and poets – as the Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 does so generously and so stylishly – is vital for our cultural health, for the continuing nourishment of our spirit and our inner selves. Professor Brian Matthews Member of the Awarding Committee Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 0 Azhar Abidi Finalist Passarola Rising (Fiction) Best Writing Award Penguin Books/Viking Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: a single work, in any genre, of outstanding clarity, originality and creativity by a Victorian writer 40 years or under.

Profile Extract of work There are nights when Azhar Abidi was born in Pakistan. His essays and travelogues have been published in It is too late now. I am an I hear the clatter of Meanjin and Southwest Review. His translations old man. Old age is not a carriage downstairs. from Urdu have appeared in the Annual of Urdu Studies. His Secret History of the Flying Carpet unhappy but it brings with I hear the sound of glasses appeared in Best Australian Essays 2004. it its own loneliness. I am tinkling and laughter spilling Azhar is an electrical engineer by training and tormented by my memories out into the dark. I fling works as a funds manager. He is married, with children, and lives in Melbourne. Passarola and sometimes, I am open my window to Rising is his first novel. assuaged by them. The see who is out there. But Summary of work careless sleep of youth the night is black. There is On the twenty-seventh day of the month only the silent rustle of the of June, in the year of grace 1731, my eludes me. I suffer from brother, Bartolomeu Lourenço, rose on his a recurring dream that forest. I fall back into my airship from the ancient ramparts of St. Jorge I have become a shadow. fitful sleep. But close to Castle. I remember the day as clearly as if it were yesterday. . . People I know pass me by. the summer solstice, when Thus begins Passarola Rising, a fabulous I walk on a boulevard but I the sky is clear and a deep historical tale of two brothers and their love of cannot enter any buildings. hush falls over the forest, flight. Bartolomeu Lourenço builds the airship Doors that were open to I lie awake in my bed and Passarola to escape the intellectually stultifying climate of eighteenth-century Portugal. He and me are now shut. I wake wait for another sound – his brother Alexandre journey from the salons up gasping for air. I twist a solitary wail that comes of Ancien Regime Paris to the far reaches of the North Pole on their quest for scientific truth. and turn in bed. I whisper from deep within the sky. They encounter many colourful characters, the names of my childhood It is this cry that reminds from the loquacious Voltaire to the irascible friends. When it rains, the me of my brother. King Stanislaus of Poland. moist soil brings to me Filled with evocative period detail, adventure and suspense, Passarola Rising is a picaresque fragrances long forgotten. tale about truth and the meaning of fraternal companionship.

10 Ben Chessel Finalist The Heartbreak Tour Best Writing Award (Screenplay) Melbourne Prize The Australian for Literature 2006 Film Commission Prize criteria: a single work, in any & SBS Independent genre, of outstanding clarity, originality and creativity by a Victorian writer 40 years or under.

Profile Extract of work INT. RYAN’S CAR – NIGHT Ben Chessell studied filmmaking at the Victorian College of the Arts in 2001. JACK’S BEDROOM. The Present Since then he has made short films in both NIGHT Flashback JACK looks at NICK, with Melbourne and Germany and continues nostalgia, RYAN looks at to develop feature films as a writer and a Abandoned vodka bottle. director. The Heartbreak Tour is his first NICK and JACK on the floor, JACK with intensity. long-form work to be produced. arms around each other, JACK Summary of work staring at the ceiling. An entire universe of The Heartbreak Tour is about being twenty something and living in urban Melbourne. JACK (VO) imaginary constellations The stories come from my experience as a I used to have stars on orbiting a sixty watt university student; becoming an adult in the supernova. I stared at terraces of Carlton and lanes of Fitzroy. It’s the roof of my bedroom, a about the way a place can hold a memory, you know: stickers, glow them when I fell asleep; releasing it when you return. Memory in the dark. imagined galaxies, planets, is not history, and different people never recall people on those planets exactly the same event. The film is bittersweet NICK melancholy, neither comedy nor tragedy, falling asleep looking down both funny and sad. This is how I remember Can I have a star? at me. You know if you lived my own twenties and I guess that’s the seed from which the script grew. JACK on Halley’s comet the earth Sure. would come around every They look into each others’ seventy six years? eyes, and kiss, slowly. TIM And it would be really f-----g cold and incredibly boring.

11 Neil Grant Finalist Indo Dreaming (Fiction) Best Writing Award Allen & Unwin Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: a single work, in any genre, of outstanding clarity, originality and creativity by a Victorian writer 40 years or under.

Profile Extract of work The currents around here Neil Grant was born in Scotland and has spent a large part of his adult life travelling Dreaming of warm water swirl down from below and working in a variety of jobs, including isn’t enough; you have to Indonesia but there is instrument steriliser, forklift driver, banana picker, dishwasher and brickie’s labourer. live it. Tucked in the nose a touch of Antarctic ice At heart, however, he is and forever will of my boardbag is my ticket in them. be a knee-boarder. to paradise. But there is A splash of Southern Ocean Grant’s love of the ocean and wild places, time for one last cold-water combined with his own passage from that makes a steamer a boyhood to manhood, inspired him to surf before I fly out tonight. good idea at this time of write Rhino Chasers (Allen & Unwin, 2002) and Indo Dreaming (Allen & Unwin, 2005). I have been here just long year. I am out the back with one other guy, watching the Photo courtesy of Ingrid Lehman enough to know this secret spot. This left-hander that grey bar where the ocean Summary of work Indo Dreaming is a surf odyssey that burls over sand-covered meets the sky. Waiting. reveals a rarely seen glimpse of Indonesia reef. Winter-stripped and its people. It is the story of Goog, who becomes compelled to follow the mysterious grapevines crossing the trail of a missing friend to the shadow-lands hills like corduroy. Seals of Indonesia. What begins as a straightforward that twist under my board plan quickly disintegrates, as Goog’s journey becomes intertwined with those he meets and come up, soft-eyed, along the way. to check me out. Simultaneously funny, compassionate, angry, heart-pounding and clever, this gritty surf-odyssey will speak to anyone who has the spirit of travel wedged in their soul.

12 Sonya Hartnett Finalist Surrender (Fiction) Best Writing Award Penguin Books/Viking Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: a single work, in any genre, of outstanding clarity, originality and creativity by a Victorian writer 40 years or under.

Profile Extract of work He didn’t move or say a Sonya Hartnett is the internationally acclaimed author of several novels including Sleeping I remember my first sight thing but I knew, just from Dogs, Thursday’s Child, Forest, The Silver of him – the sound and his watching, that he could Donkey, Of a Boy and Surrender. She has received a glittering array of awards scavenger look of him – sever my arm. We were the and commendations including the Victorian surrounded by summer; same height and the same Premier’s Literary Award (Fiction), Guardian age and built along similar Children’s Fiction Prize, Children’s Book I remember the stillness Council of Australia Book of the Year Award of the day and the density leggy lines, but he was a (Older and Younger readers), Courier Mail of the air. Neither of us hyena while I was a small, Book of the Year Award, Age Book of the Year Award and Commonwealth Writer’s was older than nine or ashy, alpine moth. From the Prize, SE Asia and Pacific Region: Best ten. I was skimming a car footpath side of the fence Book. Her work has been published in the along the garden fence he stared at me, and my UK, US, Canada, Germany, Italy, Norway and Denmark. Sonya lives in Melbourne when Finnigan crossed gaze floated grudgingly with her dog, Shilo and her cat, Idaho. the brink of my vision. from the toy. He swiped Summary of work At first I feigned ignorance a fly from his face. ‘You’re As life slips away, Gabriel looks back over that boy,’ he said. his brief twenty years that have been clouded or disdain of his presence, by frustration and humiliation. A small town but the car beneath my and distant parents ensure that he is never fingertips bunnyhopped allowed to forget the horrific mistake he made as a child. He has only two friends – his dog and soon stalled. I slid a Surrender, and the unruly wild boy Finnigan, glance at him. At school with whom he made a boyhood pact. we had seen a wildlife film When a series of arson attacks grips the projected onto a wall, and town, Gabriel realises how unpredictable and dangerous Finnigan is. Events begin to spiral the boy who was watching out of control, and it becomes clear that only me was a hyena. His dark the most extreme of measures will rid Gabriel of Finnigan for good. eyes were set apart and seemed to have no arena Dark and delicate, Surrender is a brilliantly told psychological thriller. of white.

13 Mary Ellen Jordan Finalist Balanda: My Year in Best Writing Award Arnhem Land (Non-fiction) Melbourne Prize Allen & Unwin for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: a single work, in any genre, of outstanding clarity, originality and creativity by a Victorian writer 40 years or under.

Profile Extract of work Said fast, with the Mary Ellen Jordan’s writing has been published widely in Australia, including in The Age, Just beyond the town, cling of familiarity running Australian Book Review and Best Australian past the fire tower on the its syllables together, it Essays 2001. Balanda is her first book. wide dirt road we call the turned into Manayingkarírra. Summary of work Mary Ellen Jordan left her Melbourne life to highway, the Aboriginal And when the Balandas work in Maningrida, an Aboriginal community world begins. Here in arrived, pale people from in Arnhem Land. She made the journey with the town there are tame different places with good intentions, expecting to work alongside local Aboriginal people. Once there, however, streets recently asphalted tongues that couldn’t make she was confronted by the sharp cultural into permanence – the the right sounds, this word divide between the two races, and would became Maningrida. It struggle to learn what it was to be a balanda roadworkers left last week. (‘white person’) in Maningrida; a place that Here in the town the grids changes again when I say would challenge her perceptions of race, laid out for houses force it to people in Melbourne: culture, art, language and whiteness. people to walk in straight ‘Maningrida’, I say, and This personal, moving and evocative story offers a unique insight into daily life lines, the same straight ‘Maningrita’, they reply. in an Aboriginal community, and raises lines over and over again. uncomfortable questions that go to the heart of black–white relations in Australia. Town has its distinct pockets and we move between them regulated by the geometry of Balanda planning… This place used to be called Mang djang karirra: the place where the Dreaming changed shape.

14 David McCooey Finalist Blister Pack (Poetry) Best Writing Award Salt Publishing Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: a single work, in any genre, of outstanding clarity, originality and creativity by a Victorian writer 40 years or under.

Profile Extract of work David McCooey is a poet, critic and academic. Blister Pack is his first collection Days of poems. His poems, essays and reviews have been published in numerous national The calendar discreetly and international publications, including points out that our The Age, the Sydney Morning Herald, Heat, Agenda and Australian Book Review. He days are numbered. is the author of a prize-winning critical The mountain in the distance work, Artful Histories: Modern Australian Autobiography, and the ‘Contemporary writes its brutal Poetry’ chapter in The Cambridge contract in stone. Companion to Australian Literature. He is a senior lecturer in literary studies at All the nation’s hospitals Deakin University in Geelong, where he lives. are filled with Summary of work ancient pictographs. The poetry in Blister Pack is both lucid and open to the mysterious. It hopes to have The significance of something of the haunting resonance of music. While the work does not have a narrative, it even these simplest of things does have an arc and a number of abiding still keeps evading us, concerns. Many poems in the book are ‘elegies of the everyday’. The poems try to combine The daylight that shines through minimalism and intensity, elegance and emotion. our house, the creatures As Jennifer Strauss noted in her review of the book in Australian Book Review, ‘the pleasures that bathe in the light. of McCooey’s poetry are both simple and complex’. The collection values wit, humour, and the surprise of original metaphors.

15 Ross Mueller Finalist Construction of the Best Writing Award Human Heart (Play) Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: a single work, in any genre, of outstanding clarity, originality and creativity by a Victorian writer 40 years or under.

Profile Extract of work In 2002 Ross Mueller was the Australian representative at the International Residency FOUR (Both off script – as an idea for a scene) of the Royal Court Theatre in London. In HER Okay – you go to Horacio’s and drink Guinness February 2006 he was short-listed for the New York New Dramatists Award. He has in the middle of the morning - suddenly – I dunno been commissioned by Melbourne Theatre – maybe you believe you’re a passionate Hispanic Company, Playbox, Hothouse and ABC playwright. The first email arrives at eleven am. Radio National. His most recent play – The Ghost Writer – will be produced by HIM If Tracey Emin and Sarah Kane had sex and had a the Melbourne Theatre Company next baby it would be you! year in March / April 2007 HER Quite flattering actually. Photo courtesy of Deryk McAlpine - Proof HIM You’re bewdyful. I know what you’re thinking. Summary of work Construction is a play for two actors and HER – You’re pissed already. a voice over. The play is personal, political, public and private. HIM You’re wrong. It engages with grief, loss and the conventions HER What? of storytelling in theatre. When I was working on this play – the experience for the audience HIM I’m sober. was always central to the motivation of form. Construction premiered at The Store Room HER No. in 2005 and was picked up by The Malthouse HIM Listen – and the Melbourne Writers Festival for a remount season In 2006. It was directed HER What? by Brett Adam – my long time friend and collaborator. Without him Construction HIM She would look like you and act like you and sound would not have had the breath to begin its life. like you and do what you do. She would lie – like you. You would be at home in their house. Because for you and Tracey and Sarah – it’s all about getting lost inside your work. And the work is all about love, lust, anger and nightmares. Children and stories and dedication pages. Words spew from the mouth of your stolen characters – these people on your pages are real people abducted from buses, old boyfriends and one night stands isolated voices – seriously represented in a silent velvet blackness. Insight drips from your laser printer – water drips inside me. And you know what? You’re right... I miss him like sunlight. HER Love. HIM Send.

16 Carrie Tiffany Finalist Everyman’s Rules for Best Writing Award Scientific Living (Fiction) Melbourne Prize Picador Australia for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: a single work, in any genre, of outstanding clarity, originality and creativity by a Victorian writer 40 years or under.

Profile Extract of work Carrie Tiffany was born in West Upwards, slowly, tracing Yorkshire and grew up in Western Australia. We wake in the noisy half- the triangles of my shoulder She spent her early twenties working as a blades. Then the sound of park ranger in the red centre and now lives light to the pernickety tread in Melbourne where she works as a farm of ants and the tearing him moving behind me and journalist. Her first novel,Everyman’s Rules jaws of leafhoppers. And his sharp inhalation as he for Scientific Living, won the WA Premier’s Prize for fiction and was shortlisted for the something else. The sound pushes the nightdress over Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, the Miles of movement beneath the my head. Turning me over – Franklin Award, the Orange Prize for Fiction (UK) and the Victorian Premier’s Literary Award. earth. The roots of the a hand on either side of Summary of work wheat pushing through my belly, my hair twisting It is 1934. Billowing dust and information, the soil? and spraying a mist of dirt the government ‘Better Farming Train’ slides and wheat stubble across through the wheat fields and small towns Robert reaches his hand of Victoria, bringing advice to people living my face and breasts. on the land. over my head into the stems and snaps one clean. Somewhere in the distance Amongst the swaying cars full of cows, a magpie warbles. pigs and wheat, an unlikely seduction occurs A tiny brush drags at the between Robert Pettergree, a man with back of my calf. A pause. an unusual taste for soil, and Jean Finnegan, a talented young seamstress with a hunger The stem bends under folds for knowledge. In an atmosphere of of cotton and finds its path heady scientific idealism they settle in the impoverished Mallee with the ambition of again; circling my thigh. transforming the land through science. Further rucking up of my With failing crops and the threat of a new nightdress, the muffled feel World War looming, Robert and Jean are forced to confront each other, the community of it through cotton on my they have destroyed, and the impact of buttocks then skin again – progress on an ancient and fragile landscape. the small of my back.

17 Christos Tsiolkas Finalist Dead Europe (Fiction) Best Writing Award Random House Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: a single work, in any genre, of outstanding clarity, originality and creativity by a Victorian writer 40 years or under.

Profile Extract of work Word of Lucia’s beauty Christos Tsiolkas’s first novelLoaded was filmed asHead On by . His High in the mountains, circulated slowly, but it did other writing includes the novel The Jesus where the wind goes home circulate, and men and Man, the collaborative dialogue Jump Cuts: An Autobiography with Sasha Soldatow to rest, lived Lucia, the most women began to swear by and a monograph on the Australian filmThe beautiful woman in all of the moon-milk complexion Devil’s Playground. Tsiolkas’ latest novel, of her fair skin, her slender Dead Europe, won the Fiction Prize in the Europe. Now one must not 2006 Age Book of the Year Awards and was simply dismiss this claim as long hands, the coal-black shortlisted for the 2006 NSW Premier’s Literary an exaggeration, a parochial hair that swam down to Awards. His plays include the collaborations Who’s Afraid of the Working Class? and and ignorant testament her waist. By the time of Fever (with , Patricia Cornelius, from the villagers and Lucia’s her thirteenth birthday Melissa Reeves and Irini Vela), and also kin. It is true that most of Lucia’s myth had spread Non Parlo di Salo co-written with Spiro Economopoulos. the village had not travelled so wide that travellers Summary of work far beyond the mountain would go miles out of their Isaac, an Australian photographer, is ridges which formed their way, circumnavigate the in Athens for an exhibition of his work. precarious mountain ridge, Disappointed by the reaction to his show, world. But the fame of her he commences a journey through the heart beauty had spread wide, to stop at Old Nick’s café, of Europe. The photographs he takes, from village to village, from order their coffee and however, begin to reveal a nightmarish world barely concealed underneath New Europe’s village to town, from town to chai, and sit in hope of common-market veneer. The further Isaac city, until carried in whispers glimpsing the radiant girl. travels, the further he discovers his family’s through the roaming of complicity in a curse that has its origins in the Old World’s racial, political and religious commerce and war, it hatreds. But as Isaac discovers, the ghosts became a legend that began that haunt our contemporary imaginations do not only belong to the past. They also belong to cross even borders. to the present and also to the future.

18 Henry von Doussa Finalist The Park Bench (Novella) Best Writing Award Thompson Walker Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Prize criteria: a single work, in any genre, of outstanding clarity, originality and creativity by a Victorian writer 40 years or under.

Profile Extract of work Maybe a made up name, Henry von Doussa was born in 1969 and bought up in the Adelaide Hills. In 2004 Usually just sex. one time Andrew, another he completed a Masters of Arts in Creative Perfunctory. A distraction. time Nigel. Sometimes Writing at the . His fiction has appeared inTraffic , Strange Which is always so much ‘By the way, my name is Shapes and antiThesis. more. A moment which Lennie’ and out with the Summary of work rubs against loneliness truth, about all sorts. For Lennie the grief and anguish of being and betrayal, smoothing Sometimes a real warm abandoned hit hard. The Park Bench opens as he breaks up with Daniel and from out its edges that you catch feeling and a laugh. the fallout emerges a mosaic of short fictions yourself on throughout as Lennie loiters among the men he uses to loosen the grip of despair and desire. Ezy-Neil, the day. Sometimes more The Tradie, Joe and the council gardener than you expect: calling tending the hedges are precious diversions out and finding an answer when an empty flat looms. The policing and surveillance of the body in public, the social where only silence and and moral regulation of desire, the uneasy fit agitation had been minutes between public personas and private passions, as well as family, friendship and disappointing before. Usually just sex, I hair-do’s are all confronted in the chance tell myself. A release. Other encounters and stranger-intimacies elicited times a bit of a talk after. from the park bench.

19 Prize Information

Judging and Key Dates Melbourne Prize The Melbourne Prize Trust The Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 for Literature 2006 and annual Melbourne Prize is coordinated by the Melbourne Prize Trust, $60,000 ($30,000 cash + $30,000 cash The annual Melbourne Prize was developed in conjunction with the Committee for for international travel scholarship) to meet the objectives of the Melbourne Melbourne. The prize recognises all literary Criteria – the Melbourne Prize for Literature Prize Trust. These are to recognise and genres, provides opportunity for writers and 2006 is for a Victorian resident writer whose reward excellence and talent, to inspire seeks to promote the diversity and calibre body of published/produced work has made creative development and enrich public life. of Victoria’s literary talent. an outstanding contribution to Australian The aim of the prize is to provide professional The Melbourne Prize Trust aims to increase literature and to cultural and intellectual life. development, enable overseas travel, public exposure of and access to the literary The submitted work can include, for example, international cultural exchange and financial talent of our community. The following poetry, plays, screenplays, fiction, non-fiction reward and to allow the winner to develop information provides an overview of the this and essays. his or her creative work. year’s prize, the criteria within each prize Melbourne Sister City International The annual Melbourne Prize aims to engage category and the judges. Travel Scholarship with the public through a display of the work of finalists. An exhibition will be held annually Judging The Melbourne Sister City International each November at Federation Square, Travel Scholarship, offered as part of this prize Awarding Committee Melbourne. Federation Square is the ‘home’ category, will provide the winner with cash to of the annual Melbourne Prize. Hilary McPhee AO choose his or her own itinerary and undertake Professor Brian Matthews international travel to benefit his or her creative The prize is funded by a collaboration Mark Rubbo OAM work. As part of the itinerary, provision should of public, corporate and private individual Advisory Group be made for a stay in Milan, Italy. support, via the Melbourne Prize Trust and tax-deductible Melbourne Prize Fund. Stephen Armstrong An outline of the travel program will be required Please contact the Melbourne Prize Trust Rod Morrison to be submitted to the City of Melbourne and on (03) 9650 8800 for information on how Louise Swinn Melbourne Prize Trust. to become a patron. Steve Grimwade Supported by the City of Melbourne ($30,000 The annual Melbourne Prize is ‘the prize Melbourne Sister City International Travel Key dates of the city for the city’ and is positioned, Scholarship), Tattersall’s ($20,000), the in most of the sectors of focus, as the Entries open Melbourne Prize Fund ($10,000), the Italian most valuable prize of its kind in Australia. 15 May 2006 Institute of Culture (Italian language and culture The prize runs in a three-year cycle, as follows: Entries close course) and the City of Milan. / Melbourne Prize for Urban Sculpture 2005 14 July 2006 Best Writing Award / Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Finalists announced for Best Writing Award / Melbourne Prize for Music 2007 13 September 2006 $30,000 cash Criteria – the Best Writing Award is for a The cycle commences again with the Public display at Federation Square Melbourne Prize for Urban Sculpture 2008. 13 to 27 November 2006 piece of published or produced work in any genre by a Victorian writer, 40 years or under, The Committee for Melbourne is a founding Winners announced at BMW Edge which is an outstanding example of clarity, partner of the Trust and with its member at Federation Square originality and creativity. organisations, has played a central role in the 15 November 2006 Supported by the Sidney Myer Fund, Trust’s establishment. The Committee was Hardie Grant Books and Readings. founded in 1985 and is a private organisation Selected titles are available from Readings – interested in Melbourne’s future. In supporting Carlton, Hawthorn, Malvern, Port Melbourne Civic Choice Award the Trust, the Committee’s goal is to enhance and St Kilda. Melbourne as a business and cultural capital $3,000 cash The exhibition catalogue is designed by Cornwell Design and in doing so, secure its future as a city of and printed by Rothfield Print Management. Published by A public display of the judges’ selections, world standing. The Committee’s membership Melbourne Prize Trust. © 2006 Melbourne Prize Trust Ltd including the finalists in the Melbourne Prize is drawn from senior executives across or its licensors (permission has been granted by the for Literature 2006 and the Best Writing Melbourne’s major corporations, institutions publishers and writers to include their copyright material Award will be displayed at Federation Square in the catalogue/exhibition). All rights reserved. No part and organisations – business, scientific, of this publication can be reproduced, stored in a retrieval between 13 and 27 November 2006. academic, community and government. The public will have the opportunity to vote system, transmitted or utilised in any form or by any means, The Melbourne Prize Trust is an Income electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise for their favourite work during this event. without the permission in writing from the publisher. Tax Exempt Charity listed on the Federal Supported by the Melbourne Prize Fund. Government’s Register of Cultural The public exhibition of finalists in the Organisations with Deductible Gift Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006, Recipient status. exhibited at Federation Square between For further information on the Melbourne November 13 and 27, is also available Prize for Literature 2006, the Melbourne online at www.melbourneprizetrust.org Prize Trust or annual Melbourne Prize program, please visit our website at www.melbourneprizetrust.org, call 03 9650 8800 or email 20 [email protected] Acknowledgments

The support of the Founding Partners of The Advisory Group, which supported Royce has generously provided media and the Melbourne Prize Trust, including the the Awarding Committee, included Stephen strategic communications advice and services – Committee for Melbourne and its member Armstrong, Louise Swinn, Steve Grimwade thanks to Peter Mahon, CEO, Richard Amos, companies, Minter Ellison, Ernst & Young and Rod Morrison. Their direction is Managing Director, Stephen Bracken, Associate and Cornwell, have been central in establishing gratefully acknowledged. Director, Michael Horkings, Strategic Manager the initiative. Janine Kirk AM, Executive Kate Brennan, CEO and Kate Deacon, Program and Rachel Muscat, Strategist. Director, Committee for Melbourne has Manager, Events and all at Federation Square William Buck, as auditor to the Melbourne been a champion of the project from inception. are acknowledged and thanked for their Prize Trust, is gratefully acknowledged – Minter Ellison and Ernst & Young were support to stage the public exhibition and thank you to Brad Taylor, Partner and responsible for the successful application awarding event and significant contribution to Chris Vittas, Principal Tax. by the Melbourne Prize Trust to DCITA, to be the construction costs of the exhibition display The Melbourne Prize Trust would like to thank listed on the Australian Government’s Register in the Atrium. the exhibition partners who have generously of Cultural Organisations and registration as The generous support of The Age is gratefully contributed to the event at Federation Square. an Income Tax Exempt Charity from 2004. appreciated. Thanks to Joel Becker, Director, Premier Graphics skilfully fabricated the public The Commitee for Melbourne has generously Victorian Writers Centre, Emily Harms, exhibition in the Atrium at Federation Square, supported the human resource, office Marketing Manager, Readings and other including the letter forms and event signage. and administration costs of the Melbourne organisations and publications in the literature Walter Caune, Managing Director and his Prize Trust. Thanks to the secretariat. sector including, the Australian Publishers team are thanked for their significant The Melbourne Prize Trust would like to thank Association, the Australian Society of Authors, support and partnership in the exhibition. Lady Southey AC, Diana Gibson AO, Janet Australian Literary Agents Association, Melbourne Writers Festival, Weekly Book Bill Coleby of Coleby Consulting kindly Calvert-Jones AO and The Scanlon Foundation provided event risk evaluation services and for their generous donations to the Melbourne Newsletter, Australian Book Review, Meanjin and Overland Magazine for their support. Dion Hall is thanked for his role as exhibition Prize Fund. consultant. Evan Evans made the city street The commitment of the five finalists in the The Melbourne Prize Trust gratefully banners – thank you to Roger Cameron, Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 and the acknowledges support from Garry Singer, Managing Director. 10 finalists in the Best Writing Award and their Deputy Lord Mayor, City of Melbourne, Professor Rob Adams, Director Design The Melbourne Prize Trust would like to publishers, in preparing for the public exhibition thank Roger Andrews and Rothfield Print at Federation Square, is gratefully appreciated. & Culture, Morris Bellamy, Manager Arts & Culture, Jeffrey Taylor, Team Leader City Management for their partner contribution Steven Cornwell, CEO and Mark Patterson, Culture & Collections, Jane Sharwood, to printing the exhibition catalogue and Managing Director, Cornwell and their team International Relations Program Manager, invitations. Middleditch Insurance Brokers including, Quentin Brown, Paul Monkivitch, the Arts & Culture Branch at the City of support is gratefully acknowledged. Anna Johnston and Daniel Peterson are Melbourne and Fiona Macrae, Media Advisor. Lee Wong of littleirrepressiblewonton.com gratefully acknowledged for their creative Jeff Taylor is thanked for his time and support has supported the website development. excellence in developing the Melbourne Prize as the City of Melbourne’s Program Manager Amanda Clark is gratefully acknowledged Trust’s visual identity including, the exhibition for the Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006. for her services as copy editor and at Federation Square including the letter forms The support of the City of Milan, Melbourne’s administrative assistant. and catalogue design, printed entry material, sister city, is appreciated. banners, advertising and website for the General Information Dr Marie Sierra, from the Victorian College Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006. The of the Arts and Strategic Advisor to the Board The Melbourne Prize Trust is listed on the 2006 prize winner’s trophies were designed of Melbourne Prize Limited, has made a major Australian Federal Governments Register by Cornwell and cast by Fundere Fine Art contribution to the direction of the 2006 prize. of Cultural Organisations with Deductible Foundry, Melbourne, who also make the limited Gift Recipient status and is an Income edition bronze miniatures of The Magic The Management Committee of the Melbourne Tax Exempt Charity. Pudding sculpture, located in the Royal Prize Fund including Jack Smorgon AO, Botanic Gardens Melbourne. Director Escor Pty Ltd, Janine Kirk AM, Please visit melbourneprizetrust.org Executive Director, Committee for Melbourne, for further information on the Melbourne The Melbourne Prize Trust would like to David Blake, Partner, Ernst & Young, Anthony Prize Trust and annual Melbourne Prize. acknowledge and thank the key partner Poynton, Partner, Minter Ellison and Simon organisations, whose generous financial For information on how to make a tax Warrender, Melbourne Prize Trust are thanked support has allowed the prize categories deductible donation to the Melbourne for generously providing their time. in the Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006 Prize Fund or enquiries about purchasing The Magic Pudding to be offered. These include the City of The Melbourne Prize Limited Board, including a miniature of sculpture, Melbourne, Tattersall’s, the Sidney Myer Fund, Janine Kirk AM, Pamela M Warrender and located at the Royal Botanic Gardens Hardie Grant Books, Readings Books Music Simon H Warrender are acknowledged for Melbourne, please contact the Melbourne Film and the Italian Institute of Culture. their guidance. Prize Trust on 03 9650 8800. The dedication of the Awarding Committee Michael Andrew, Chairman of Partners – Melbourne Prize Trust for the Melbourne Prize for Literature 2006, Victoria, KPMG is acknowledged and ‘Milton House’ Level 2 including Hilary McPhee AO, Mark Rubbo thanked for his support. 25 Flinders Lane OAM and Professor Brian Matthews, is Melbourne VIC 3142 greatly appreciated. T 03 9650 8800 F 03 9650 6066 E [email protected] www.melbourneprizetrust.org www.melbourneprizetrust.org