2 swf.org.au RESEARCH & ENGAGEMENT 1817 - 2017 luxury property sales and rentals THE UN OF ITE L D A S R T E A T N E E S G O E F T A A M L E U R S I N C O A ●C ● SYDNEY THE LIFTED BROW Welcome 3 SWF 2017 swf.org.au A Message from the Artistic Director Contents eading can be a mixed blessing. For In a special event, writer and photographer 4-15 anyone who has had the misfortune Bill Hayes talks to Slate’s Stephen Metcalf about City & Walsh Bay to glance at the headlines recently, Insomniac City: New York, Oliver, and Me, an the last few months have felt like a intimate love letter to New York and his late Guest Curators 4 long fever dream, for reasons that partner, beloved writer and neurologist extend far beyond the outcome of the Oliver Sacks. R Bernadette Brennan has delved into 7 US Presidential election or Brexit. Nights at Walsh Bay More than 20 million refugees are on the move the career of one of Australia’s most adept and another 40 million people are displaced in and admired authors, Helen Garner, with Thinking Globally 11 their own countries, in the largest worldwide A Writing Life. An all-star cast of Garner humanitarian crisis since 1945. admirers – Annabel Crabb, Benjamin Law Scientists announced that the Earth reached and Fiona McFarlane – will join Bernadette City & Walsh Bay its highest temperatures in 2016 – for the third in conversation with Rebecca Giggs about year in a row. Millions more people have been Garner’s influence. Event Liftout 12-13 left in reduced and uncertain circumstances, and In Parramatta’s Riverside Theatres, Jimmy feel that nobody is listening. Barnes will discuss his extraordinary memoir In times like these, we have a choice. We can Working Class Boy. The Curiosity give in to the rising zeitgeist of insular thought We’re thrilled to be presenting a full day 16 and intellectual suspicion or we can look for of YA programming in Parramatta for the Lecture Series ways to fight it. first time, with international stars Jennifer Specifically, in this Festival, we look to books, Niven and Mariko Tamaki headlining a Family Day 17 to literature, to new forms of writing, where packed program of award-winning Australian some of the world’s finest minds have started At 19, Hisham Matar’s Libyan father was authors including Amie Kaufman and Garth 19 circling the wagons. Now, more than ever, I think kidnapped and held in a secret prison. Hisham Nix. Family Day will return to Walsh Bay, Workshops that readers will be turning to literature as a never saw his father again. Peter Carey called his with crowd favourites Lauren Child, Andy place of refuge. astonishing memoir The Return “a triumph of art Griffiths and Kate DiCamillo. All Day YA 19 In a recent speech at the Winter Institute, over tyranny”. This year, the Festival has three guest feminist writer and commentator Roxane Gay Award-winning podcast Slate’s Culture curators: Rebecca Huntley, Peter Polites and said: “Throughout my life books have been my Gabfest will record its first-ever show outside Ellen van Neerven, who have enriched the Suburban & Regional 20 best friends. In bookstores and with books I have of North America, live from Sydney Town program with their unique vision and interests. been able to forget the cruelties of the world. Hall. Beloved Slate critics Stephen Metcalf, You can find our local curators’ events on 21 I have been able to shield myself when I needed Dana Stevens and Julia Turner are like your Page 4 of this guide. Blue Mountains safety. I have been able to find solace and joy. smartest, funniest friends; friends who happen In the Darkroom is Pulitzer Prize-winning I have been able to find sanctuary – a consecrated to know the best in books, film and the arts from journalist Susan Faludi’s extraordinary Participants 22 place, a place of refuge and protection.” around the world before you do. inquiry into the meaning of identity in the Incidentally, Roxane will be a guest at this Elaine Welteroth, the woman who’s making modern world. Faludi will deliver our Closing 23 year’s Festival. over teen stereotypes as newly appointed editor Address, exploring the theme of refuge; from Venues & Bookings Across the 2017 Festival, some of the world’s of Teen Vogue, will talk about why the article the metaphorical shelter of books, to the basic most curious and compassionate, irreverent Donald Trump is Gaslighting America became physical safety that millions seek today. but respectful, intelligent and argumentative the most-read piece in a publication previously In a not-to-be-missed event, Susan will WEBSITE Our new website is your writers will be offering up their brilliant works known for its stories on dating and lipstick. bring her experience to bear on some of the essential guide to the 2017 Festival, as temporary respite, and interrogating the Sophie Black will discuss the politics of fear urgent questions of our age. When is refuge featuring up-to-the-minute information on forces that compel us to come together and with David Marr, whose new Quarterly Essay real, and when is it illusory? And who among the program, authors and events as well find sanctuary. The White Queen examines the peculiar power of us doesn’t seek it? as important details about venues, facilities, To open the Festival, three of the world’s most the fearful in our prosperous nation, and John In May, hundreds of inventive, audacious and accessibility and everything you need to celebrated literary figures will each deliver an Safran, whose new book Depends What You Mean inquisitive writers from all around the world plan a perfect Festival experience. address on the theme of refuge. by Extremist explores the mad world of misfits who will lead Sydney in a week-long conversation. swf.org.au Brit Bennett’s The Mothers is one of the most propelled the second coming of Pauline Hanson. We hope you’ll be a part of it. We hope you find refuge with us. SOCIAL CHANNELS Join the conversation dazzling debuts of the past year, a luminous and Witness a rare and revealing conversation on Twitter and Instagram using wise story of young love and friendship, and a big with two giants of crime fiction – Scotland’s Ian #SydneyWritersFestival secret in a small town. Rankin of Inspector Rebus fame and Australia’s Michaela McGuire Anne Enright won the Man Booker Prize for own Michael Robotham. Ian will also appear in Artistic Director Follow our Facebook page for all the latest The Gathering, and her latest offering, The Green conversation in Parramatta with New York Times Festival news and offers. Road, is as characteristically bleak, funny and bestselling author Candice Fox. sentimental as the best of her work. In a centrepiece event of the Festival, our EMAIL NEWSLETTER Sign up to our email The singular George Saunders, the writer for own panel of ‘Nasty Women’ – Brit Bennett, newsletter at swf.org.au to receive the our time, makes his first visit to Australia with Durga Chew-Bose, Viola Di Grado, Anita Heiss, latest Festival news, first access to limited- his incendiary first novel, Lincoln in the Bardo. Chris Kraus and Nadja Spiegelman – take to the release tickets and special offers from our This year’s Festival is an embarrassment of stage to share cautionary tales, life lessons and friends and partners. riches, and this is only the first event. good advice. PODCASTS Visit our podcast channel, Colson Whitehead discusses his 2016 Literary luminaries Robert Dessaix, Hannah accessible on our website or via iTunes, and National Book Award-winning novel, the furious Kent, Hisham Matar, Ian Rankin and Joy explore highlights from past Festivals in our and wildly inventive The Underground Railroad, Williams will reveal the books that made them extensive archives. Selected 2017 Festival with the editor of The New York Times Book want to become writers, offering an insight into events will be released as podcasts from Review, Pamela Paul. what shaped them, and informed some of today’s June onwards. Cult writer Chris Kraus will discuss her most important works. provocative body of work with Krissy Kneen, Celebrated UK neurosurgeon Henry Marsh PRODUCED BY THE SMH, FAIRFAX MEDIA including the controversial auto-fiction I Love will discuss his new memoir Admissions, in ADVERTISING 9282 1783 Dick, which has been adapted for television by which he reflects deeply on his 40 years of READERLINK 9282 1569 Transparent’s creator Jill Soloway. experience operating on the surgical frontline. [email protected] “I never took myself seriously as a writer until I studied at Macquarie.” LIANE MORIARTY MACQUARIE GRADUATE AND BEST-SELLING AUTHOR Studying the Master of Creative Writing put Liane on track to topping the New York Times best-seller list – twice. Her book Big Little Lies is now a hit TV series on HBO. See where Macquarie can take you. mq.edu.au/creative-writing PHOTO: uber photography CRICOS Provider 00002J | FOA2765 4 swf.org.au City & Walsh Bay MONDAY MAY 22 – THURSDAY MAY 25 Winter is here, and escapism is the name of TUESDAY, MAY 2 the game. Durga Chew-Bose, Tom Griffiths, 1 SWEARING IN: VEEP’S ARMANDO Guest Curators Eliza Henry-Jones and C.S. Pacat discuss IANNUCCI ON SPIN AND SATIRE which fictional world they’d prefer to be in. May 2, 6–7pm This year’s program is enriched by three writers who have brought their unique creative vision to the Festival.