Hidden Author
Andy Kissane and Belle Ling, joint winners of the 2019 Peter Porter Poetry Prize.Andy Kissane and Belle Ling are the joint winners of the 2019 Peter Porter Poetry Prize, worth a total of $8,500. This is Australia’s premier prize for an original poem. Andy Kissane's winning poem is titled 'Searching the Dead', and Belle Ling's winning poem is titled '63 Temple Street, Mong Kok'.
The winners ... (read more)
Why do you write?
To find out what I truly think and believe. Every novel is a new journey of discovery. It’s just a shame it has to end one day …
Are you a vivid dreamer?
Yes. But nearly all my dreams turn around the same anxiety: being lost. Sometimes I’m in an alien city or sometimes in a wilderness, or sometimes in a banal environment like a hotel corridor or a car park, but in every ... (read more)
What was your pathway to publishing?
I put an advertisement in the London Times newspaper in 1964 or thereabouts, which stated ‘Australian BA, typing, wants job in publishing’. I got three offers and accepted one, which was being a menial for a sponsored book editor at Hutchinson’s. But my real pathway was my mother and father, both great readers; I grew up surrounded by books.
Do you edit ... (read more)
Supporting the ABC
ABR, like many writers and media organisations around the country, worries about the future of independent journalism, especially in this trumpacious age, often so hostile to reason and open commentary. We share many Australians’ concerns about the health and viability of the ABC. The threats are myriad and sustained. Funding cuts (by all regimes), political interference, a ... (read more)
Brendan Ryan grew up on a dairy farm at Panmure in Victoria. His poetry, reviews, and essays have been published in literary journals and newspapers. He has had poems published in The Best Australian Poems series (Black Inc). His second collection of poetry, A Paddock in his Head, was shortlisted for the 2008 ACT Poetry Prize. His most recent collection of poetry, Travelling Through the Family (Hu ... (read more)
Gig Ryan’s last book was New and Selected Poems (Giramondo, 2011), published in the United Kingdom as Selected Poems (Bloodaxe, 2012). Manners of an Astronaut (Hale & Iremonger, 1984) was re-issued by Shearsman Books, UK, in 2018. She was Poetry Editor of The Age from 1998 to 2016. Her work first appeared in ABR in 2001 when it began publishing new poetry. She lives in Me ... (read more)
Bella Li is the author of Argosy (Vagabond Press, 2017), which was commended in the 2017 Wesley Michel Wright Prize, highly commended in the 2017 Anne Elder Award, and won the 2018 Victorian Premier's Literary Award for Poetry and the 2018 Kenneth Slessor Prize. Her work has been published in a range of journals and anthologies, including Best Australian Poems and The Kenyon Review, and displayed ... (read more)
Lisa Gorton, who lives in Melbourne, is a poet, novelist, and critic, and a former Poetry Editor of ABR. She studied at the Universities of Melbourne and Oxford. A Rhodes Scholar, she completed a Masters in Renaissance Literature and a Doctorate on John Donne at Oxford University, and was awarded the John Donne Society Award for Distinguished Publication in Donne Studies. Her first poetry collecti ... (read more)
Anita Patel has had work published in various journals including Conversations (Pandanus Press, ANU), Block 9, Burley Journal, Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, Demos Journal, Mascara Literary Review, and Not Very Quiet Journal. Her poem 'Women’s Talk' won the ACT Writers Centre Poetry Prize in 2004. She has performed her work at many events, including at the Canberra Multicultural Festival, the P ... (read more)