Writers share $45,000 as nation listens in
Adult Australians who struggle with reading will benefit from a new, innovative form of support with the release this week of recorded short stories, which dramatise the inner lives of people learning to read as adults.
Written by Australia’s best new and established writers, and read by professional actors, the 21 recorded short stories run for around five to 10 minutes each, making them an easy listen.
National Director of Writing Australia, Mary Delahunty, said the exciting new release stories were about characters ranging from construction workers to waitresses, and were the fruition of an Adult Learners’ Week writing competition which attracted more than 300 entries.
“The competition was held to find and record stories, true or fictional, which would inspire adults to learn to read or improve their reading”, she said.
“There is an amazing range of settings and characters in the winning stories, which have been produced as recordings to help reach the 46 per cent of Australians who struggle with literacy.”
“Running this innovative competition has been the first key project for Writing Australia, the new national affiliation of state Writers’ Centres, and we are delighted that it features Australia’s best contemporary writers, as well as new voices.”
“The release of the new stories sets the stage for 2012, the National Year of Reading, which has ambassadors including comedian Anh Do and patron William McInnes.”
Judges were Australian authors Leonie Norrington, who herself returned to study literacy as an adult and went on to become an award-winning author; Amanda Curtin, lecturer and prize-winning fiction writer; Rohan Wilson, winner of the acclaimed The Australian / Vogel Award for a novelist under 35; and Sean Williams, New York Times best-selling speculative fiction writer.
Twelve previously published writers have each won a $3,000 cash prize, and nine previously unpublished writers won $1,000 in a total prize pool of $45,000.
Authors of the stories are: Jane Downing, Matt Blackwood, Amy Jackson-Shelling, Maria Arena, Jennifer Mills, Philomena van Rijswijk, Sophie Constable, Penny Gibson, Tom Dullemond, Melanie Joosten, Ruth Starke, Tansy Rayner-Roberts, Kirralee Baldock, Faten Chendeb, Cassandra Dickerson, Karen Eastwood, Kath Harper, Vanessa Jones, Mark Joseph, Kerri Turner and Steve Wilson.
The competition and prizes have been funded by the Australian Government Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations (DEEWR), through Adult Learners' Week National Grant Funding.
The competition has been a partnership between the National Year of Reading 2012, the Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA), Writing Australia, the NT, and Queensland Writers' Centres and writingWA.
Recorded audio podcasts, as well as printable text versions, of the short stories are available for free download at the National Year of Reading website, http://www.love2read.org.au/never-too-late.cfm.
Monday 24 November 2011
INTERVIEW CONTACT: Mary Delahunty, National Director, Writing Australia, Ph 03 9682 0475, email: ceo@writingaustralia.org.au