To coincide with the Emerging Writers Festival‘s first trip to Tasmania, we decided it was a good time to start asking some nosey questions.
So STM. Who are you (really) and how did you get here?
I am STM. I was born on the Central Coast of NSW, the salty stretch between Sydney and Newcastle, which was once called a ‘cultural wasteland’ by a newspaper columnist who I respect. I did some Sydney stuff for a long while and then I became the Director of the Emerging Writers’ Festival late last year, moving south to Melbourne, bringing together the components that made the monster that was the 2013 programme. I’m now trying to go a little farther south and relocate the festival in Hobart for three days.
What do you like/hate most about being the director for EWF?
It’s great to be able to walk up to nearly 300 writers once a year, and ask, ‘Hey, do you want to get together for ten days, and hold seventy eight events, where we will celebrate your writing, your work and your world in what basically amounts to the longest and best party in the country?’
298 writers will say yes, and then the other two will try to gatecrash the party once it’s raging and they’ll be called dopes by their friends for turning us down, but they’ll still come and have a fun time. Well, what I don’t like so much is that I don’t get as much time to do my own writing. I got bashed on a website for not being a writer earlier this year, and that stung, because I’m putting a lot of ambitions on hold to do this job. But I don’t cry about it too much, because I think it’s an incredible position to be in – to be able to promote other emerging writers and get to advocate for Australian writing in general.
What are you reading at the moment (if you have time for such things)?
I’ve been rediscovering the fierce talents of the late Barry Hannah, short story writer and Southern American localist. I watched a Youtube video the other night of a writer, Louis E. Bourgeoisie (not to be confused with the incredible Louise Bourgeoisie), who got very teary over the loss of Hannah, because he was also a great supporter of writers. Hannah was a great, great mentor to many writers. It’s something to aspire to as a writer, I think. You don’t want anyone to tear up over your death in a Youtube video, but I don’t think you should isolate yourself and I think you should share your knowledge with others.
I’ve also finally gotten around to reading Ross Gibson’s Seven Versions of an Australian Badland – which was one of the books that poet Emily Stewart gave away in her incredible project at the festival this year, where she… gave away all her books – and I’ve really been digging Michele Lee’s irreverent memoir Banana Girl.
What’s brought EWF to Tasmania this year?
When I went for the job of Director, I definitely wanted Tasmania to be the next location for the annual interstate Roadshow of the festival. It turned out it was already on the cards, with a few conversations having taken place with Dale Campisi, who was then editor of Island. The conversation continued with current editor Matthew Lamb, who has been to a few Emerging Writers’ Festivals in the past.
Have you personally been to Tassie before?
I first came to Tasmania in 2004. I was just out of high school, so it was my version of schoolies. I didn’t want to do the Gold Coast or anything like that. I came down to check out Flippers, the floating fish and chip shop on the waterfront, because I’d read Leigh Rigozzi’s mini comic about working at the shop, that he used to sell when he worked there. It was a strange form of cultural tourism, because I really did love Leigh’s work and it was the main reason for me going down there (it’s great to be bringing Leigh back down for the Graphic Content event). Well, after seeing Flippers, which took about half an hour, I went backpacking around the island for three weeks and was glad that a zine could have introduced me to such a diverse place. I’ve been back a couple of times since for camping and bushwalking trips – and MONA FOMA, of course.
What do you hope to see come out of this roadshow?
This is the first time we’ve run the Roadshow over three days. It’s pretty wildly ambitious in that sense, so I just hope people get the most out of it that they can get. The luxury of the three days, I think, will be in allowing us to get to know people while we’re down there. It’s been a real privilege to have conversations so far with the program, whether that be with Matt and Dale of Island, Chris Gallagher at the Tasmanian Writers’ Centre, Caitlin and Lesley at Twitch. Ben Walter, who will soon be Tasmania’s Barry Hannah, no doubt, not in style but as a similar supportive figure, has been incredibly generous in his programming suggestions. I’m looking forward to having those conversations out in the open and I’m really hoping there’s an opportunity to bring people across to the main festival in 2014 to highlight some of the amazing work being done in Tasmania to our national audience.
The two big pieces of professional development programming – the Digital Writers Conference on Thursday, and the Young Writers Program on Saturday, which of course, centres on bringing Twitch together with Stilts – will, hopefully, be of use to writers as they go about developing their own work and practice.
The other great thing that’s happened is that there are a number of literary magazines coming with us, specifically their editors and publishers, because Matt has organised a bit of a roundtable discussion for the various editors to talk about their concerns – and this means they’ll be around for the weekend – Meanjin, Overland, The Lifted Brow, Stilts, Kill Your Darlings, Going Down Swinging, Voiceworks. We’ll be able to celebrate the work that they’re doing – and, in a lot of ways, they’re the most important spaces for emerging writers.
So the Friday night will be Meet the Magazines at The Hobart Bookshop followed by The Lifted Brow’s Mixtape Memoirs, which was one of the best events at our festival this year.
If you had a metal band, what would you call it?
Hot Pink Death Balloon School, definitely. We’d all wear kind of hot pink t-shirts to disarm the audience before throttling them.
Does Tasmania have a big metal scene? I found myself in a heavy metal bar in Adelaide after a writers’ festival one year. That was a great night and proved just how surprising festivals such as this can be.
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Check out the Emerging Writers Festival program and BOOK
Images courtesy of STM: EWF merch being unwrapped, STM, and Steph van Schilt watching over some literary magazines at EWF 2013