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UQP authors at Newcastle Writers Festival
05 Apr 2024 – 07 Apr 2024
Newcastle, NSW

UQP authors at Newcastle Writers Festival

Newcastle Writers Festival has unveiled their program for 2024, and we are thrilled to share that the following UQP authors will be appearing at this year's festival.

Free and ticketed events available - follow the links below or visit the Newcastle Writers Festival website to book.


Saturday 6 April

SUNBIRDS: MIRANDI RIWOE IN CONVERSATION - 10-11am

As an artist, Mirandi Riwoe is concerned with recreating histories too few of us know. Her new novel Sunbirds, takes readers on a journey through time to West Java in 1941 when love and revolution are in the air – and war is on its way. Mirandi speaks with Ashley Kalagian Blunt about engaging with colonialism and its reverberations.

THE PAST AND THE NOW: MELISSA LUCASHENKO IN CONVERSATION - 10-11am

Spanning the 1800s to 2024, Melissa Lucashenko’s recent novel Edenglassie weaves together the lives of colonial-era and contemporary characters. Moving deftly from heartwarming and hilarious to harrowing, what shines through most is the incorporation of First Nations language, spirituality, and ritual. Melissa speaks with Keri Glastonbury about the lovable cast of characters, who grapple with family, culture, activism, and accountability across timelines.

WOMEN & CHILDREN: TONY BIRCH IN CONVERSATION - 11:30am-12:30pm

At the end of Women & Children, Tony Birch leaves a note for readers: ‘It is not the story of my own family, but a story motivated by our family’s refusal to accept silence as an option in our lives.’ He speaks with Chris Flynn about the trauma of violence, the freedom of justice, and the remarkable cast of characters grappling with both in his critically acclaimed novel.

WRITING COUNTRY AND CONNECTION, with Sara M Saleh - 1:30-2:30pm

‘Be part of something bigger / hear the ancestral lines speak / more connected yet clearly less one “self”’ writes Susie Anderson in The Body Country. Susie is joined by Sara M Saleh and Rob Waters for a conversation about place, memory and belonging in their recent poetry. They discuss the interconnection between identity and creativity with Magdalena Ball.

HAUNTED BY THE PAST, with Mirandi Riwoe - 3-4pm

To be human is to be haunted by the past: the narratives of our collective and subjective worlds. Three authors grapple with colonial, personal, and family history in their recent fiction, blurring the lines of fantasy and reality and creating characters who ask, ‘Can we lay these ghosts to rest?’ With Winnie Dunn, Mirandi Riwoe and Lucy Treloar. Hosted by Cath Keenan.

SETTLING THE SCORE: ELLEN VAN NEERVEN IN CONVERSATION - 4:30-5:50pm

‘This is an ugly book that was born of the ugly language I grew up hearing in this country,’ writes Ellen van Neerven in the introduction to Personal Score: Sport, Culture and Identity. Ellen speaks with Beejay Silcox about their unique book, which blends memoir and poetry and explores sovereignty and survival on the sporting field.


Sunday 7 April

FINDING IT IN THE FAMILY, with Tony Birch - 10-11am

When stories are passed through generations, how does that shape the ones we tell ourselves? These novels use memory and lore to blend the real with the imagined. Tony Birch, Andre Dao and Laura Elizabeth Woollett share how family history helped inform their fiction. Hosted by Bernadette Brennan.

WHEN WORLDS COMBINE: SHELLEY PARKER-CHAN IN CONVERSATION, with Chris Flynn - 10-11am

History, fantasy, and queer culture combine in Shelley Parker-Chan’s No. 1 bestseller She Who Became the Sun and follow-up novel He Who Drowned the World. Described as ‘Mulan meets The Song of Achilles’, the books reimagine the rise to power of the Hongwu Emperor in 14th century China, but with a gender-bending twist. Shelley speaks with Chris Flynn about how gender, masculinity, and white Australian culture find centre stage in their genre-defying novels.

THE LAST DAUGHTER: BRENDA MATTHEWS IN CONVERSATION, with Melissa Lucashenko - 10-11am

At two years old, Brenda Matthews and her siblings were taken from their parents. For five years, she lived happily as a much-loved daughter within a white family, before being swiftly reunited with the birth family she barely remembered. Decades later, Brenda searched for her foster family and learned the truth about her past. Brenda appears in conversation with Melissa Lucashenko about her memoir and Netflix documentary, The Last Daughter.

ON REMEMBERING AND FORGETTING: A POETRY PERFORMANCE, with Jazz Money, Ellen van Neerven and Sara M Saleh - 11:45-12:45pm

As we negotiate a world of co-existing crisis and beauty, poetry can help us make sense of our place in the contemporary moment. What we remember and what we forget is often a social, familial, political, and personal process; the way that we reinscribe meaning or power into our pasts to help determine our futures. Join Jazz Money, Ellen van Neerven, Sara M Saleh, Rob Waters and Iona Winter as they perform works that contemplate the personal, political, and social histories that inform our present.

RAGE AND RESISTANCE, with Sara M Saleh - 1:30-2:30pm

‘…Art sustains life … showing people things they otherwise might not see’, observes a protagonist in Sara M Saleh’s Songs for the Dead and the Living. In fiction and in life, where do we go when words fail us and language isn’t enough? How can art tell stories that we need the world to understand? Daniel Browning, Sara M Saleh and Lucy Treloar discuss drawing on rage and resistance to write hard truths. Hosted by Jackie Dent.

BLURRING GENRE, BUILDING WORLDS, with Chris Flynn - 3-4pm

Sharlene Allsopp, Kate Mildenhall and Shelley Parker-Chan have redefined world-building in their new fiction – weaving together the past and the present to disrupt the stories we’ve always told ourselves. Listen to how these authors build new worlds, break down old ones, and create characters pulsing with heart. Hosted by Chris Flynn.

POETICS AND PRACTICE: JAZZ MONEY IN CONVERSATION - 4:30-5:50pm

Jazz Money is a nationally acclaimed Wiradjuri poet and artist. With a practice centred in poetics, their work has been published internationally and exhibited around Australia as art installations, digital interventions, and film. Join Jazz Money in conversation as they speak about their poetry and multidisciplinary practice.