Category Archives: NZ poetry event

The Going West Books and Writers Festival celebrates 20 years with a line-up of outstanding home-grown authors, playwrights and songwriters

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I am delighted to be chairing a poetry session with Kerry Hines and Leilani Tamu.

GOING+WEST-LOGO-2015

The Going West Books and Writers Festival celebrates 20 years with a line-up of outstanding home-grown authors, playwrights and songwriters in a packed programme of events this September.

Featuring enthralling new non-fiction by David Slack, Roger Horrocks, and Geoff Chapple; new novels from Greg McGee, Stephanie Johnson and Anna Smaill and poetry by Harry Ricketts and Leilani Tamu, audiences will also be treated to an appearance from Rachel Barrowman talking about her just-published biography on Maurice Gee and biographer Lucy Treep offers a tantalising insight into the life of Maurice Shadbolt.

Festival founder and director Murray Gray says this year’s writers will become part of the considerable legacy of conversations built up over two decades.

Going West Festival audiences have been treated over the years to extraordinary events featuring such literary luminaries as Allen Curnow, Michael King, Nigel Cox, Ian Wedde, Anne Salmond, Lauris Edmond, Maurice Gee and Maurice Shadbolt.

The festival is named after its Patron, Maurice Gee’s novel Going West. “I’ve been to many writing festivals but none as relaxed and friendly as the Going West…Long may it continue,” says Gee.

Gray adds that this year’s festival sees some landmark announcements.

“I am delighted to say the Going West Trust,  in association with the Waitakere Ranges Local Board, will be offering a new creative residency from 2017, in Maurice Shadbolt’s home of some 40 years, here in Titirangi.

“The house has plenty of material for writers to draw on. Shadbolt loved a party, and there were many in his home. He had a colourful personality and lived here through four marriages.  We are so pleased the Waitakere Ranges Local Board has entrusted us with the lease of this culturally valuable property,” says Gray.

The Festival also announces a partnership with Auckland’s  new home for Māori theatre, Te Pou who will be holding  a Koanga (Spring) Festival offering a range of performances, writing workshops and readings and culminating in a community Whānau Day of storytelling on Saturday 12 September at the theatre’s home 44A Portage Road, New Lynn.

Te Pou will present a development season of The Great American Scream by award-winning playwright Albert Belz in the Going West Festival from 17-19 September.

Going West Festival welcomes lauded theatre work, Sister Anzac, by Geoff Allen,  which runs from 3-6 September at Te Pou Theatre in New Lynn.

Stand-up poets have time to sharpen their acts before the Going West Poetry Slam takes place on 12 September. Directed by Doug Poole, this will be a fun, fast-paced evening featuring some of the country’s best known bards. Handsome cash prizes to be won.

Stephanie Johnson, who made her first festival appearance, with an early  novel at the first Going West Festival in 1996, will be the Sir Graeme Douglas Orator this year. This will be part of the festival weekend’s opening night celebrations on Friday 11 September.

The full Going West Books and Writers Festival programme will be online at www.goingwestfest.co.nz from July 9. For tickets go to: www.iticket.co.nz

The Festival is grateful for support from the Waitakere Ranges Local Board, Creative New Zealand, The Trusts Community Foundation, Foundation North and the Douglas family Trust.

Key dates:

9 July                                     Going West Books and Writers Festival LAUNCH

TICKETS ON SALE

11- 13 September            Going West Books and Writers Literary Weekend. Titirangi War Memorial Hall, 500 south Titirangi Rd, Titirangi

12 September                   Going West Poetry Slam. Titirangi War Memorial Hall, 500 south Titirangi Rd, Titirangi

www.goingwestfest.co.nz                           www.facebook.com/goingwestfest

WRITERS ON MONDAYS In the company of a master: Vincent O’Sullivan

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WRITERS ON MONDAYS

In the company of a master: Vincent O’Sullivan

We kick off our 2015 programme in grand style with one of New Zealand’s finest. Poet Laureate Vincent O’Sullivan’s impressive writing career includes poetry, biography, novels, plays and short stories. His recent publication Being Here is the first to survey the entire span of O’Sullivan’s poetry, from 1973’s Bearings to new poems first published in this volume. Join us as O’Sullivan and longtime publisher and friend Fergus Barrowman take a journey back through an illustrious writing career, discussing favourite themes and preoccupations, recent work, and the public role of poetry.

Writers on Mondays is presented with the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa with support from National Poetry Day and Circa Theatre.

 

DATE:  Monday 13 July

TIME:   12.15-1.15pm

VENUE: Te Papa Marae, Level 4, Te Papa
(Please note that no food may  be taken onto the Marae).

NZ Flash Fiction: A National Week of it, every which way you look!

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In today’s Sunday Star TImes

Flash writers on writing flash and what it means to them:

Michelle Elvy

(NFFD founder and organiser)

My tips: Don’t beat around the bush. What you omit is as important as what you say; there’s beauty between words – in the space you create, at the edges of the story. Don’t go for gimmick. Edit: when you think you’re done, cut it in half. Quality over quantity.

Owen Marshall

(NFFD 2015 judge)

It’s about control of language, perception of human nature, originality, emotional power. A lot has to be done by insinuation and subtext, every word has to do its job. It really has to have something to say.

Gill Ward

(creative writing teacher; 2015 shortlisted writer)

It’s like when people tell a story. They don’t use a lot of words but they still tell it in a way that you understand. In a lot of modern fiction, they like to try and stay mysterious, but when you’ve only got a certain amount of words you can’t afford that luxury.

Hayden Pyke

(2015 shortlisted writer)

There’s something quite cool about finishing something; the satisfaction of actually having something completed. I just try to write about the things that are happening with the people in my life. It’s important to me that those little things that happen in people’s lives that are maybe looked over and seem quite mundane, that those things get written about as well.

Frankie McMillan

(previous NFFD comp winner and judge, 2015 twice shortlisted writer)

Flash leaves room for the reader to respond, you can publish on your own Facebook page, people get used to being efficient with language. As a tutor, it’s good for teaching students about using imagery to suggest, rather than spelling it all out. Most of all you want something that lingers in the mind; so you put it down and it’s still with you half an hour later.

 

For the rest of today’s Sunday Star Times article with comments on Flash Fiction by other writers see here.

For full list of Flash Events go here:

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Other Flash Around Aotearoa

Northland June 3 * Dunedin June 8 * Auckland inside.out June 10 * Masterton June 23 * Details below for each event

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 NORTHLAND June 3

Northland Flash Fiction Competition and event

Flash Fiction Competition 2015

Whangarei Libraries is sponsoring a Northland flash fiction competition for the fourth year in a row. Competition has already closed but the winners will be declared at a special awards ceremony on Wednesday 3 June 2015, 5.30 pm in May Bain Room, Whangarei Central Library.

Short-listed stories will be read and winners will be announced. All are welcome.

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DUNEDIN June 8

The NZ Society of Authors Otago Southland Branch is holding a Flash Fiction themed Writers Salon on Monday June 8 at The Thistle Cafe & Bar in The Octagon.

The theme for the Writers Salon in June – 6pm Monday June 8 – will be Flash Fiction

We will feature eight writers reading work of 500 words. All selected contributions will include the word flash in one of these forms:

Flash
Flashed
Flasher
Flashest
Flashing
Flashy
Flashier
Flashiest
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AUCKLAND INSIDE.OUT June 10

insideout June 10Inside.out open mic for writers goes flash in june — inviting writers of flash fiction to come share your stories. Hosted at the One2One Cafe, 121 Ponsonby Rd, Ponsonby.

inside.out runs open mic spots for writers of any experience or genre. Stories and poetry are illuminated when read aloud or performed. Meet other writers as well. Excellent musicians and competitions with prizes at each event. The cafe is licensed with hot snacks and great coffee.

Entry by koha, which goes to the musicians that night.

Come from 6pm; open mic starts at 7pm.Let’s hear what you’ve been working on…

Find inside.out on Facebook /

contact MC Anita Arlov: anitaarlov@hotmail.co.nz   tel. 021 100 40 77 

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MASTERTON June 23

SHORTisSWEETposter (1)

Short Is Sweet — Flash event at the Masterton District Library on 23 June. All are welcome!

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REGIONAL AWARDS

This year, regional awards for the best flash fiction stories entered in the national competition are being offered by the NZ Society of Authors branches in the following regions:

Auckland * Canterbury * Central District *

Hamilton * Northland * Otago * Wellington 

Regional Awards will be announced on June 22. NFFD is excited and grateful to have the support of the NZ Society of Authors branches.

NZSA LOGO

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If you would like to organise something in your area, get in touch!

Contact

nationalflash [at] gmail [dot] com

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And if you happen to be in the UK the following week, after our June 22 events have closed, check out the UK NFFD. June 27, 2015. Details here.

a birthday shelf made into a beautiful blue book

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Anna Jackson (and Helen Rickerby) presented me with this yesterday. Utterly gorgeous.

divine shade of blue, exquisitely hand stitched, heavenly end papers, internal design ever so sweet

 

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A Birthday Poetry Shelf for Paula Green from NZ poets — thank you!

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Saturday June 6th:

This morning, after breaking my rule of not talking about my private life on social media, I wrote about my strange and marvellous last day in my 50s on Facebook.

Then this link arrives. I burst into tears. You just do what you do. But to have this gift of poems to read on my first day in my 60s is extraordinarily moving.

For the web page go here. The driving force was my dear friend Anna Jackson. Beautifully designed by Helen Rickerby, idea for a web page conceived by Harry Ricketts. This is a beautiful birthday gift I will always treasure.

Thank you friends and fellow poets.  Thank you.

Love

Paula

Starling: Showcasing New Zealand’s Best Young Writers – to be edited by Louise Wallace & Marty Smith

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Starling takes flight

Showcasing New Zealand’s Best Young Writers

A new opportunity for young writers has emerged today. Starling (www.starlingmag.com) is an online literary journal that will be published twice yearly, accepting poetry and prose from only New Zealanders under 25 years of age.

The founder and editor is poet, Louise Wallace, author of two collections of poetry and the current Robert Burns Fellow at the University of Otago. The journal will be an opportunity for young writers to showcase their work in a professional environment to a national audience. “There is nothing quite like this out there at the moment in New Zealand – certainly not with the national focus we hope to cultivate,” Wallace says. “It can be difficult for young writers to find publication with our more established print journals when they are competing for space with writers who have twenty or thirty or forty year’s experience. Starling levels the playing field.”

Wallace is keen to convey that the quality of the work will still be there. “Just because a writer is under a certain age, does not mean the quality of the work is any less. The journal has a high standard for acceptance and we are committed to presenting our contributors and their work seriously – in that way the submissions we receive and the writing we publish will be the best of the best.”

Starling is also focused on a community approach. Each issue of the journal will open with new work from an established New Zealand writer and will close with an interview with a person of note from the literary industry. Wallace says there are a few things that are crucial to the journal’s success. “The first is obviously getting young writers to submit. But we also need support from readers. We have a selection of posters available on our website that people can download and put up out in the real world to encourage submissions, and the website also allows supporters to sign up for email updates. Without these people taking that extra step, there will be no community.”

Submissions are now open for Issue 1, with a deadline of 20 October 2015, the issue to be published January 2016.

Wallace is joined by Co-editor, Francis Cooke, and Schools Coordinator, Marty Smith, who like Wallace, are graduates of the International Institute of Modern Letters MA programme. Cooke’s short stories have been published in a number of national journals, and Smith’s first collection of poems, Horse with Hat, won the Jesse Mackay Award for Best First Book of Poetry at the 2014 NZ Post Book awards, and was a finalist in the poetry category. Smith is also a high school teacher, and will work with Wallace to deliver the journal as a resource for New Zealand teachers in the classroom.

Selina Tusitala Marsh wins the Literary Death Match at the Australian New Zealand Festival in London

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Congratulations!

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Rest of Ivor’s review see here