NEWCASTLE WRITERS FESTIVAL 2024

Newcastle Writers Festival is my favourite weekend of the year.

As a Bibliophile, word nerd, and a Librarian, this is my Mecca. 

The program had some tough choices this year, with sometimes 4 or 5 sessions on simultaneously I wanted to see but of course could not without cloning myself.

So choices were made, and they were all bloody magnificent.

As always, one of the very best things about the festival is who you run into! Close friends, colleagues, and friends I have not seen for a while. Those moments are truly amazing.

Opening night, Friday 5 April

Newsmaker: an evening with Leigh Sales in conversation with Indira Naidoo

As always, the erudite raconteur, Dan Cox was the MC, keeping the night flowing beautifully. Speeches were made, including an always rousing one by Rosemarie Milsom, founding director. What a legend, without her vision and the hard work of her team, there would be no NWF.

The main act was a great conversation with Leigh Sales about her new book, she was in conversation with the equally impressive Indira Naidoo and they were the perfect pair. The stories ranged from the sad to the funny, tips and techniques for interviewing and listening, and such an intimate and lovely conversation that you often felt like you were privy to friends talking. It was such a delight.

Leigh is very funny and intelligent, so is Indira, but she has a lovely warmth to her that I had forgotten, having not seen or heard her in recent years. I always loved her on Club Buggery. 

It was a night well worth heading out in that awful weather. Stormy, windy and heavy rain didn't stop a huge group of us enjoying opening night. After all, we haven't missed one since the beginning of the festival over a decade ago.

Saturday 6 April

Andrew has not done a full day of the festival, only the odd session here and there and this year we collaborated on our Saturday attendance. As a high school teacher he teaches History, Geography, Business, Legal Studies, and Society and Culture, so a lot of our choices were informed by Society and Culture.

We had a very full day with 6 sessions from 10am to 9pm, he loved every minute of it and came home as tired but thrilled as I do. To have a partner that shares in the things I love, because he loves them too, is absolutely wonderful.

We split our first session, and he headed to see David Marr, who he fanboyed over and came out of very excited. David spoke about his new book, Killing for Country, the subject matter is very traumatic, but the book itself sounds quite amazing. As only David Marr could be. It is about finding out his ancestors were part of the brutal frontier police. Andrew asked a question, (an actual question!) and got a lovely 10 minute answer. Well done!

Book of Life: Deborah Conway in Conversation

I commenced with one of my musical heroes, Deborah Conway. I purchased her book last year but it has been sitting on one of my many piles of To Read at Club Cathy. I love her voice, her ideas, her feminism, and her outspokenness. I have met her once a few years back and to be honest I was terrified. I needn't have been, but she is formidable.

She has been in the hotseat politically and culturally of late. If the reporting is correct, some of her comments about the Israel/Palestine conflict have been very unfortunate. So I was a little unsure about heading to this session. It was meant to be in the large hall at the conservatorium but had been moved to a much smaller room in the New University building. We arrived to a police presence and I was very anxious about the whole thing. I didn't want to end up on the news.

I needn't have worried, the whole session was handled beautifully. Deborah spoke beautifully about her book, a memoir of her life in music. It sounds terrific and I cannot wait to read it. She told us tales of writing songs, exploring music, performing, and how she navigated the music industry and being a parent to three teenage daughters. Her husband, Willy Zygier was with her in the audience, listening intently and lovingly. They performed a few songs.

In this intimate room, it was actually quite amazing, and very intimate. There was love in the room, which I think eased things significantly. After I headed to get my book signed. She looked exhausted, but was up for a chat. She signed my book and I admitted I hadn't yet read it. She was like I understand, my to read pile is quite large. I then asked her what she had been reading, and she had been getting into WWII history, and enjoying a biography of Winston Churchill.

Things we Don't Speak About: Class

This was a really interesting session. Jessie Stephens and Peter Polites discussed using class in their fiction. The session was hosted by Beejay Silcox, who really lifted the session with her own highly relevant input and humour. I was given a copy of Peter's first book a few years back and haven't had a chance to read it and I should. Whilst everyone was interesting, he engaged me the most. He spoke about coming from a Greek immigrant background and how that adds whole other levels of class.  

The In-between: Christo Tsiolkas in Conversation

This was my favourite session on Saturday. Whilst I have not read all of CT's books, the ones I have read I have always enjoyed or appreciated. I don't think anyone enjoyed The Slap, lol. Christos was in conversation with the great David Marr. They obviously know each other and had a great rapport. This took the session up a few levels. Christos spoke about his new book, writing, being gay, and many other things. I always find him a much gentler soul than his voice in words on paper. 

What I loved the most was two older gay men having a great conversation about life and being able to chat about their lives openly and freely with love in front of an adoring and appreciative audience. And I don't think that was lost on them. I could have sat there all day listening to them. It was just wonderful.

The Long Haul

The long haul was about long Covid. It had Rosemarie Milsom in conversation with Tracey Spicer and Dr Steven Faux. It was really interesting and quite frankly, really frightening. Tracey has long covid and her descriptions of her symptoms (everyone has different symptoms) which sounded quite awful. 

Dr Faux is amazing, his background was in rehabilitation for chronic diseases. Once Covid hit, he got a quite a few referrals from GPs and specialists who were unsure what was going on. It took a fair bit of research to have their initial diagnosis of long covid to be taken seriously and they are still trying to educate a lot of the medical profession and the general public on the disease.

Tracey spoke about being gaslit by her doctor who said she was depressed. There were a lot of people in the audience who were going through (or knew people who were going through) similar experiences. 

I don't know anyone with this, but it terrifies me. The whole Covid thing always has and I do not think very highly of anyone who is dismissive of it, it shows a serious lack of intelligence and empathy.

Welcome to Sex: Yumi Stynes and Dr Melissa Kang in Conversation

This was one of my favourite sessions of the day. Firstly, Dr Melissa Kang is Dolly Doctor. Boom!! I found out she was DD some years back, and I was thrilled and my mind blown. She is the most elegant, intelligent, and remarkable woman. Listening to her speak is some kind of mystical, magnetic experience. She has us all in the palm of her hands. Secondly, I love Yumi Stynes and her fierce passion. They were in conversation with Maeve Marsden, who was a tremendous host. 

They talked about sex and consent and their books, and it was wonderful. Serious and funny, informative and intelligent. They have a wonderful relationship, Melissa and Yumi, a seemingly odd couple but when you hear them talk, that is so far from the truth. We laughed a lot and were humbled by their knowledge and humanity. 

There was one awful moment, when the topic of Yumi being targeted, because people are dicks, she broke down. It was so upsetting to watch, the vitriol she suffered, the death threats, the threats to her children, it was absolutely infuriating. I felt so much for her, when all she was doing was being honest about sex in the most respectful way.

A Bloody Good Idea: Bryan Brown in Conversation

Bryan Brown is the real deal...in case you hadn't worked it out, lol!
He arrived on stage to great fanfare. He was exactly as you would imagine and had so many wonderful Australian tales to tell. You couldn't help but smile and feel in awe to be in his presence. 

He spoke about his writing process, that is pretty much he nails it in his first draft, which is a little annoying lol. He had some great ideas, and was writing them down, more for screenplay ideas as he does a lot of producing. Someone convinced him to turn them into short stories and he was published. Now he has written his first novel which sounds pretty good.

Mostly he just told us stories from his life in film. He said he does not think of himself as a writer or an author but a storyteller, and that he is. I particularly loved his story from Gorillas in the Mist, the first time he went up the mountain and how powerful and terrifying the gorillas were. I am sure one day there will be a brilliant memoir from him. It was the perfect way to end a very long and rewarding day.

Sunday 7 April

Only a few sessions today, and I was solo as Andrew had headed back to Sydney.

Lies My Mirror Told Me: Wendy Harmer in Conversation

This was a wonderful session, I could listen to Wendy talk all day. Her early life was quite tragic and she walks that lovely fine line between drama and comedy with it all. I always loved her, since the early Big Gig days. What a phenomenal women, leading all those wonderful comedians. She had the audience in awe with her tales, laughter and brilliance.

After I lined up to get my copy of her book signed. She was generous with her time and we chatted about The Big Gig and she said it was a wonderful experience but there would be no way something like that would be made again, which is spot on but sad. She doodled in my book as we spoke. I felt like I had unlocked meeting another one of my heroes, and it was a great feeling.

Boy Conquers Universe: Bharat Nalluri in Conversation

This was a phenomenal session, easily the best for Sunday and possibly the entire weekend. I was really lucky to get a ticket as it sold quickly. Rosemarie hosted Bharat and told the story of how she booked him for the session. She was about to hit send on the program when she got contacted by a friend asking if she has Bharat on the program. Rosemarie had never heard of him but found out he was seminal in getting Boy Swallows Universe on the screen for Netflix. She was interested but thought it too late but found out he lived in Newcastle!

Wait? What!?

So Bharat is an Indian born director/producer who has worked in the US and the UK. He married an Australian foreign correspondent, Kylie Morris, whilst in the UK and they came back to Australia for a short stay then Covid happened and they haven't left.    

 

Bharat has worked on Life on Mars, Torchwood, and Spooks amongst other shows and the movie, Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day. But he recently steered Trent Dalton's Boy Swallows Universe to huge success for Netflix. He spoke about meeting Trent and taking on one of Australia's favourite books and making into a mini series. There was a script already written when he came on board and he asked for it to be rewritten and it didn't have the heart of the book. He spent a lot of time with Trent in Brisbane, scouting locations and looking at photos of Trent's life so he could accurately showcase the book. 

Australia and the UK work on the same TV model, where a main director takes on the first couple of episodes and then employs other directors to finish the series while he oversees the production. He directed the first 2 episodes, but was involved with every aspect of the show, including the script, casting, production, music and so forth. He spoke about it with so much confidence and detail you could see why the series was so wonderful. 

He also confirmed what we already knew, that Trent Dalton is the nicest man in Australia. He also spoke at length about the casting (and looking after) of the 2 young boys cast as Eli and Gus. He spoke about getting series right like Boy Swallows Universe as Lightning in a Bottle, but hearing him talk, I was not so sure. He spoke with so much knowledge, care, and understanding, It couldn't have been anything but perfect.

Best Wishes: Richard Glover in Conversation

I do love Richard Glover, and this was a great way to end the weekend. Richard told tales from his life and new book. Hosted by the wonderful Dan Cox, Richard was like a great stand-up comic sharing his greatest hits. Once he gets going, you are on that ride with him and it is glorious. His upbringing was nothing short of horrific, but yet he is always sunny and uplifting. What a remarkable human being.

And so I headed home very weary, but my heart and soul and creative juices were flowing. And this is why it remains my favourite weekend of the year, I can live off that brilliance and creativity for a long time.

Finally, late Saturday, when we had a bit of a longer break, Andrew and i went all the way to the top of the Nu Space building to check out the stunning views over Newcastle. If you get the chance, you must do the same.