Advances

Here we go again!

There are few certainties in this world, but newspapers can be relied on to conjure stories and brouhahas from a select group of cultural activities. Screen a movie to a class of undergraduates, or add pulp fiction to a curriculum, and The Australian – possibly even the prime minister – will be down on you like a ton of bricks. Should Opera Australia go into the red, all hell can be relied on to break loose. If Radio National has the audacity to cover both sides of a story, you can be sure it will pay a heavy price.

The judges of the ABR Poetry Prize certainly earned their pastrami on rye this year! Could the short list have been closer, the final choice more difficult? Doubtful. Morag Fraser, Peter Rose and Craig Sherborne agree that a number of the six short-listed poems (which appeared in the March issue) would have made worthy winners. Such is the tyranny of competitions, they had to choose a single poem, and it took a while – longer in fact than Brendan Ryan’s marvellous road poem, ‘Back Roads, Local Roads’, took to unfold.

Ten years ago, the venerable essay was a kind of Australian fossil, rare as compassion in a bourse. They still figured in the learned journals, but other sightings were infrequent. When the current Editor of ABR proposed the first major anthology of Australian essays to his then colleagues at OUP, it was doubtless perceived as yet another instance of his eccentricity, but when it was published in 1997 Imre Salusinszky’s Oxford Book of Australian Essays was greeted with enthusiasm. Other anthologies followed in the 1990s, including the first of the Black Inc. Best Australian Essays, a series that now runs to eight volumes. Never has the essay form been more visible, more necessary, more popular, give or take the odd skirmish. Tamas Pataki’s ‘Against Religion’, published in our February issue, is a fine example of how essays can captivate and get under people’s skin. No other essay has so polarised our readers or generated as much correspondence, ranging from a kind of epistolary sigh of relief that ‘someone has said it at last’ to indignation at Dr Pataki’s supposed temerities (see our Letters pages, and there are more to come). That’s a good thing, and ABR looks forward to presenting other views on the subject, plus a response from Dr Pataki in the April issue.

Join us on March 6 during the Adelaide Writers’ Week when the Editor of ABR will announce details of a major new sponsorship and prize to be offered this year. We can’t go into details yet, but this is an event that no common or uncommon reader, least of all Australian writers, will want to miss. We will also be launching our March issue, which is largely devoted to Art and Architecture. Luke Morgan of Monash University is co-editing the issue with Peter Rose. A highlight of this annual thematic issue is Dr Morgan’s long article on the state of art criticism in Oz, which seems likely to provoke a few Cubist expressions in the art world! This launch (a free event) will take place at 12.30 p.m. on Monday, March 6, in the West Tent, Pioneer Women’s Memorial Gardens.

This year we received eighty-seven entries, with a good range in all three categories, children’s/young adult books; fiction; and non-fiction/poetry. New South Wales contributed almost half the entries; but each state was represented. It’s always interesting to note the most popular titles. This year they were Sonya Hartnett’s Surrender and Christos Tsiolkas’s Dead Europe. Sadly, no one chose to review the Sydney and Blue Mountains Street Directory, that straight classic, but we were impressed by two entrants’ celerity in reviewing The Latham Diaries. (David Free has won third prize for his review of the same.)

ABR Poetry Competition

Earlier this year, Stephen Edgar won the inaugural ABR Poetry Competition. He picked up a cheque for $2000, and ABC Television made a feature about him and other shortlisted poets – not bad coverage for poets in a country many of whose newspapers and general magazines have so lament-ably and short-sightedly reduced their coverage of poetry. Well, the competition is on again. Its principal aim is to uncover some of the best new poems being written in this country. Up to six of them will be shortlisted in the March 2006 issue; the winner will be announced in April 2006. Full details appear on page 8. The entry form is also available on our website, or on request. The closing date is December 15.

An evening with J.M. Coetzee

ABR (in association with La Trobe University and the City of Melbourne) is delighted to be able to invite all our readers, but especially our subscribers, to what promises to be one of our major events for the year, when the masterly novelist and critic J.M. Coetzee will read from his work. This rare opportunity for Victorians to hear the Nobel Laureate and author of Disgrace and Life and Times of Michael K will take place at the Melbourne Town Hall at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, August 4 (we suggest you arrive at 5.30 to ensure you get a seat). Full details appear on page 5. This is a free event. La Trobe University will also confer the degree of Doctor of Letters (honoris causa) on J.M. Coetzee during his visit to Melbourne.

ABR goes to London

Hot on the heels of our inaugural ABR Forum in Canberra on March 28, when a capacity audience attended the session on life-writing at the National Library, ABR will host its first event in London on Tuesday, June 8. Peter Rose and Morag Fraser will present an evening of readings and ideas, with special appearances by Clive James and Peter Porter. We’re delighted to be able to present this special event in association with the Menzies Centre for Australian Studies, Kings College London. The event will run from 6 to 8 p.m. Bookings are essential: please direct them to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. ABR has many subscribers and supporters in the UK; we look forward to meeting them – and to reaching new ones.

The poet Bruce Beaver died on February 17, something we couldn’t note in the March issue of ABR, as we had just gone to print. Since then, the tributes have been many, and utterly deserved. We publish Beaver’s poem ‘October 1999’ in this issue, along with a tribute from Tom Shapcott. UQP informs us that it will release the poet’s posthumous collection, The Long Game and Other Poems, on 17 February 2005.

This month we welcome back Aviva Tuffield, who returns as Deputy Editor, a new position for ABR and one that reflects her seniority and her long commitment to the magazine. We also farewell, with many thanks, Anne-Marie Thomas, who filled in while Aviva Tuffield went on maternity leave. Dianne Schallmeiner remains as Office Manager, and Alastair Lamont joins our admirable team of volunteers.