Why Write? single work   essay  
Issue Details: First known date: 2020... 2020 Why Write?
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'There was a Facebook message from Hetti Perkins, which was an odd coincidence. I was working on a poem about her late father Charlie for a collection, which I would later abandon as I grew aware that I lacked the precision for poetry. The early interest I had attracted leading to these opportunities was more about a literary industry driven to uncover diverse new voices than an acknowledgement that with hard work and patience I might become a great writer. Attention that provided motivation but pushed emerging writers in directions at once exhilarating, confusing and premature. At the time I was considering using the title ‘Peeling’ for the poetry chapbook when I noticed her message. The poem was about her father’s role in the Nancy Prasad incident, where a five-year-old Fijian girl was deported to Fiji, symptomatic of Australia’s racist immigration policies of the 1960s.' (Introduction)

Notes

  • Epigraph: Being a writer can feel a lot like writing and giving up on writing at the same time. - Alexander Chee, How to Write an Autobiographical Novel

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

  • Appears in:
    y separately published work icon Meanjin vol. 79 no. 1 Autumn 2020 19046095 2020 periodical issue

    'In this edition's cover essay, Gomeroi poet, essayist and scholar Alison Whittaker takes on the idea of white fragility and asks 'Has white people becoming more aware of their fragilities and biases really done anything for us—aside from finding a new way to say 'one of the good ones' or worse, asking us to?'. Whittaker aims squarely at a progressive white culture that sees an elevated racial conscience as a path to post-colonial innocence.

    'In other essays, Timmah Ball asks that most fundamental of questions: Why Write? 'Were they looking for the next successful blak book.' while Anna Spargo-Ryan writes powerfully on the often-brutal history of abortion in women's lives and men's politics. Rick Morton shares his version of Australia in Three Books and Maxine Beneba Clarke considers risk and writers' acts of courage.' (Publication summary)

    2020
Last amended 25 Feb 2021 08:44:01
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