Another stimulating line-up of new fiction, poetry, scriptwriting and nonfiction returns to Wellington as part of the popular annual Writers on Mondays series.
Another stimulating line-up of new fiction, poetry, scriptwriting and nonfiction returns to Wellington as part of the popular annual Writers on Mondays series.
Beginning in mid-July and presented by Victoria University of Wellington's International Institute of Modern Letters (IIML) in conjunction with Te Papa, the series’ special international guest for 2014 is United Kingdom based novelist, publisher, translator, poet and anthologist, Michael Schmidt.
Michael’s illustrious career includes founding Carcanet Press and editing the world-class literary journal PN Review.
In conversation with poet, painter and essayist Greg O’Brien, Michael will discuss his latest work, a history of fiction simply called The Novel: A Biography.
IIML director Professor Damien Wilkins believes the 2014 programme is a wonderful combination of new voices and established writers.
“This will make this series a brilliant fixture on the literary calendar.”
The Writers on Mondays programme starts on Monday 14 July with what is set to be a lively session featuring Auckland-based novelist and journalist Tim Wilson.
Reading from his raucous new satirical novel News Pigs, Tim will interrogate New Zealand’s self-image as “the Plucky Little Country” with fellow broadcaster and writer Richard Langston.
The following week, the audience will hear from three new poets–Maria McMillan, Rachel O’Neill and Marty Smith–who will give readings and discuss about their debut collections of poetry.
Next, literary all-rounder Geoff Cochrane will join publisher Fergus Barrowman in conversation about Astonished Dice, a new collection of Cochrane's best short stories.
August will feature Victoria University/Creative New Zealand Writer in Residence Hinemoana Baker, who will share her experience of the residency, read from her new book of poems, and reveal some of her work in progress–a moving personal account of involuntary childlessness and her father’s traumatic childhood in a Nelson orphanage.
Curator Kirstie Ross will join Victoria’s Kate Hunter to share some of the treasures they discovered while writing Holding on to Home, an account of New Zealanders’ experience of World War I told through objects that act as emotional touchstones to bring this distant event back into our hands.
National Poetry Day will also be celebrated when nine top poets read work selected for the 2013 edition of Best New Zealand Poems (www.victoria.ac.nz/bestnzpoems), introduced bythe anthology’s editors, Professors Jane Stafford and Mark Williams.
Returning to fiction, Dominion Post columnist and Commonwealth Writers’ Best First Book Prize winner Craig Cliff and Ngā Kupu Ora award winner Tina Makereti talk about writing into the spaces between magic, realism and history in their acclaimed novels The Mannequin Makers and Where the Rēkohu Bone Sings.
September will showcase the emerging new voices from the IIML’s Master of Arts in Creative Writing Programme. The penultimate session will feature seasoned scriptwriters Peter Cox, Kelly Marshall and Dave Armstrong who will talk about the highs and lows of the scriptwriting life.
The 2014 series rounds off with a trio of writers discussing newly released memoirs of home, exile and pain: Ian Wedde (The Grass Catcher), Helena Wísniewska Brow (Give Us This Day) and Stephanie de Montalk (How Does it Hurt?).
Writers on Mondays events run from 12.15–1.15pm, each Monday from 14 July until 29 September at Te Papa, The Marae, Level 4. Admission is free.
Writers on Mondays is presented by Victoria University’s International Institute of Modern Letters with the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, and National Poetry Day. Michael Schmidt’s visit is funded by the New Zealand Centre for Literary Translation at Victoria University.
The full 2014 Writers on Mondays programme appears below, but can also be viewed online: http://www.victoria.ac.nz/modernletters/about/events/writers-mondays
Full programme
14 July
News Pigs: Tim Wilson
We’re pleased to welcome journalist and novelist Tim Wilson to Wellington. Wilson turned to fiction after his stint as US correspondent for TVNZ, and his first novel Their Faces Were Shining was a finalist in the 2011 NZ Post Book Awards. In this session, he will read from his raucous new novel News Pigs and explore the boundaries of satire, fact and fiction with fellow broadcaster, writer and TV presenter Richard Langston. Join us for what promises to be a highly entertaining session.
21 July
Tree, Horse, Human: Three New Poets
‘We all sift through the drift of inheritance to find what is magnetic, useful and active,’ writes Rachel O’Neill. Personal and family histories rub up against the wider domains of science, politics, pop and digital culture in the work of Maria McMillan (Tree Space), Rachel O’Neill (One Human in Height) and Marty Smith (Horse with Hat). The authors of three new poetry collections read from their work and reflect on the process of writing, collating and finally seeing that first full-length book materialize with chair Therese Lloyd.
28 July
The Astonishing Geoff Cochrane
Geoff Cochrane's latest book, Astonished Dice, is a collection of his published short stories. Showcasing Cochrane’s compressed, fragmentary style and dark-edged humour, Astonished Dice is an important addition to the catalogue of this major talent. Join us as he discusses his fiction with publisher and friend Fergus Barrowman.
4 August
Waha | Mouth: Hinemoana Baker
Join us to hear 2014 Victoria University/Creative New Zealand Writer in Residence Hinemoana Baker in conversation with Chris Price. With a new book of poems, waha | mouth, freshly released in July, Baker is currently working on a book about her own experiences of involuntary childlessness and her father’s traumatic childhood experiences in a Nelson orphanage. She will discuss how retelling her father’s story is a way to acknowledge the painful past, and to move on with grace.
11 August
New Zealand at War: Kate Hunter & Kirstie Ross
Te Papa Press’s publication Holding on to Home is a ‘powerfully human and compelling illustrated history of New Zealand’s war experience’ that tells the stories of real New Zealanders at war from battlefront to home front through the objects they held dear. The authors, historians Kirstie Ross and Kate Hunter, will discuss their research journeys and the discoveries they made along the way. Paul Diamond will chair this event.
18 August
Best New Zealand Poems 2013
What better way to anticipate National Poetry Day* than with a line-up of nine of the best? Come along to hear Kate Camp, Mary-Jane Duffy, Dinah Hawken, Anna Jackson, Therese Lloyd, Greg O’Brien, Rachel O’Neill, Chris Tse and Ashleigh Young read their poem selected for the annual online anthology Best New Zealand Poems, plus a favourite NZ poem. The editors of this year’s selection, Professors Mark Williams and Jane Stafford, will introduce the poets.
(*National Poetry Day is on 22 August)
25 August
From Sprint to Marathon: Craig Cliff and Tina Makereti
In 2010, Writers on Mondays showcased the debut short-story collections of two dynamic new writers: Craig Cliff and Tina Makereti. We pair these two writers again to discuss their second books—Cliff’s The Mannequin Makers, and Makereti’s Where the Rēkohu Bone Sings. Makereti’s novel has been described as ‘generous’ and ‘unshrinking’ and Cliff’s as ‘engaging and deadly smart’. Chair Kate Duignan asks how these two writers made the switch from short story to novel, what were the different challenges presented by both genres, and what are they working on now?
1 September
Literary Lives: Michael Schmidt
In association with the NZ Centre for Literary Translation, we're proud to present Mexican-born Anglophone man of letters Michael Schmidt. A poet, novelist, translator and anthologist, Schmidt is also founder/publisher of two of the UK's most illustrious and globally-minded poetry outlets, Carcanet Press and PN Review, and has for many years been Professor of Poetry at Glasgow University. Following his compendious Lives of the Poets (1998), Schmidt has just published an equally comprehensive and engaging look at how the novel made the modern world. The Novel: A Biography has been hailed as 'brilliant, intimate, assured, and almost unflaggingly interesting' (The Atlantic). Chaired by Gregory O’Brien.
8 September
The Next Page 1
A wonderful opportunity to hear a fresh mix of poetry and prose by this year’s intake of writers at the Masters in Creative Writing Programme at Victoria University. Brandy Scott, Freya Sadgrove, Luke Elworthy, Ines Almeida, Rebecca Nash, Rebecca Hunt, Gina-Marie Aburn, Bernie Coleman, Lucy Bailey, and Craig Gamble are introduced by Chris Price.
15 September
The Next Page 2
Part 2 of these always popular sessions features readings from Patrick Hunn, Ben Egerton, Rupa Maitra, Faith Wilson, Alison Burdett, Anahera Gildea, Georgia Godwin, Juliet Allnatt, Max Chapnick and Doug Dillaman. The writers are introduced by Emily Perkins.
22 September
A Survivor’s Guide to Scriptwriting
Join us for a panel discussion with three experienced scriptwriters for stage and screen. Peter Cox created and wrote the indie hit TV series The Insiders Guide to Happiness as his MA thesis in 2005 and has worked in television ever since. Kelly Marshall, in NZ to share her expertise with the 2014 MA Script workshop, has an extensive and award-studded background in writing and directing for television in the UK. All-round scriptwriting guru Dave Armstrong (whose play Rita & Douglas enjoyed a sold-out run at Circa earlier this year) has won the Chapman Tripp Theatre Award three times, and worked on many hit TV series. They compare notes on the highs and lows of the scriptwriter’s life with chair William Brandt.
29 September
A Home in this World
In his new memoir The Grass Catcher, Ian Wedde writes, ‘We are all at home in places constructed as narratives, and in selves who act like characters in those narratives.’ Helena Wísniewska Brow’s Adam-Prize-winning Give Us This Day chronicles her father’s exile as one of the Polish orphans who arrived in NZ in 1944, and in her memoir How Does it Hurt?, adapted from her PhD in Creative Writing, Stephanie de Montalk imaginatively explores the internal exile of the chronic pain sufferer. Join these three memoirists for a conversation about home, exile, and character in creative nonfiction, chaired by Harry Ricketts.
