What does it feel like to face fear on the page? From embodying emotion, to revisiting the stuff of nightmares, these writers discuss what fear is, and how it can propel one’s writing.
Event sold out? Join the Waitlist HERE.
The Emerging Writers’ Festival work, learn and play largely on the land of the Kulin nation, and pay our respects to their Elders, past and present.
EWF celebrates the history and creativity of the world’s oldest living culture.
What does it feel like to face fear on the page? From embodying emotion, to revisiting the stuff of nightmares, these writers discuss what fear is, and how it can propel one’s writing.
Event sold out? Join the Waitlist HERE.
Wheelchair, Service Animal, Quiet Room (Reception/Level 3 Library), Hearing Loop, Accessible toilets
Friday 13 September
The Wheeler Centre
Performance Space Level 2, 176 Lt Lonsdale Street, Melbourne, 3000, VIC
Madeleine Rebbechi is a writer based in Naarm/Melbourne. She has written music and arts reviews, radio scripts and media kits, but her true love is fiction. In 2022 she was highly commended in the Moth Short Story Prize, and in 2023 her story ‘Dip’ was published in the Kill Your Darlings anthology New Australian Fiction. She was awarded runner up in the 2023 Overland Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize, and is the 2024 recipient of the ASA/Varuna Ray Koppe Fellowship for Young Writers. She is currently working on a short story collection.
Alex writes for television, theatre, audio and fiction. His play Rakali was nominated for Best Theatre at the 2023 Melbourne Fringe, and called “gloriously original” and “deliciously entertaining” by critics after a sold out season. He wrote, directed and acted in seven-part audio drama “Hovering”, produced by Clea Frost and released in November 2023. He writes across many genres, including horror, thriller and comedy, often using an element of magic realism or supernatural to transform an everyday situation into something complex. He brings his experience as a queer person growing up in a small town in Tasmania into his work.
Em Starr (she/her) is an Australian horror writer, whose work has appeared or is forthcoming, in numerous publications, including Midnight Echo Vol 18, Fear of Clowns: A Horror Anthology, and Spawn 2: More Weird Horror Tales About Pregnancy, Birth and Babies. She lives in Melbourne, on Boon Wurrung land, with one husband and two naughty dogs, Nikko and Franco (aka Dick-Dack and Fron Bon Jovi). She is currently writing her debut novel, a surf horror set in 1990s Australia. Em is a proud member of the Horror Writers Association, and Australasian Horror Writers Association.
Tuesday 10 September, 8:30AM
Start the morning with an intuitive walk around Melbourne followed by a writing session. Walking can allow the mind to process information and shake new ideas loose. Likewise, exploration and observation of built and natural environments can inspire thought and help us create new connections for our writing.
Wednesday 11 September, 8:30AM
Indulge in one hour of shared sustained silence, in a simple ritual to concentrate on the thing we want to do — but so often find many reasons not to — write.
Monday 9 September, 11:15AM
Arts writing is often the best way to start out as a writer – to have your writing published, work with editors, meet likeminded people and make a bit of a cash. But it can be hard to know what pocket to start out in and how to sustain.
Thursday 5 September – Sunday 15 September
Join a cross-continental in-conversation reflecting on the evolving role of storytelling in a global context. Witness this exchange of ideas and dreams, as each writer enquires into the other’s diverse creative practice.
Australia’s premier festival for new
and emerging writers.
The Emerging Writers’ Festival work, learn
and play largely on the land of the Kulin nation,
and pay our respects to their Elders, past and present.
EWF celebrates the history and creativity
of the world’s oldest living culture.
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