Please note:
- Due to the Library’s extensive renovations, these events will be held in the Michael Crouch room, on Level 1, instead of in the Dixson Room. Level 1 is accessible by lift or stairs at both ends of the building.
- The cafe has been temporarily relocated to the Dixson Room – it is open for coffee etc but limited food is available.
Workshop
Anna Fienberg: Middle Grade children’s books
Time: 10:15 am to 12:00 pm
Place: Michael Crouch Room, State Library of NSW
Cost: Members $40, non-members $55
How to live? How to understand ourselves and others, the plots of our lives? Writers often write to discover what they think about these fundamental questions but in the process, blocks move in like icebergs instead.
In our workshop, we’ll discuss some ways to thaw ourselves out, to transform ideas into characters, and find the stories that we want to write.
As a child, Anna was a passionate reader and found that reading and writing have much in common. She has written more than forty well-loved books for children and young adults. Her career started with School Magazine, a children’s literary journal, for which she and the other editors read 1000 books a year to review. Her first serial for the Magazine became her first book, and she went on to win many awards for her novels and picture books.
Anna writes for all ages and in 2009 her novel for adults, Escape, was published. Her books for children have been published all over the world and her ever-popular Tashi books, illustrated by Kim Gamble, have inspired an animated series for television.
Later this year, a special 30th Anniversary Edition of Tashi, together with collected stories and previously unseen illustrations from Kim’s sketchbooks and notes will be published.
Her latest novel is Picasso and The Greatest Show on Earth, short-listed for the NSW Premier’s Awards, 2024.
Literary Event
Time: 1:00 pm to 2:30 pm
Place: Michael Crouch Room, State Library of NSW
Cost: Members $25, non-members $40
Member Newsbites
Five members speak for three minutes about their recent, current or future projects. Put your hand up to participate if you have a favourite project you would like to talk about.
Guest Speaker – Jacqueline Kent: How to be an Inconvenient Woman
The generation of women between the suffragists and the Vietnam protesters included a group of trailblazing writers who challenged the nation’s status quo. Acclaimed biographer Jacqueline Kent traces these women’s stories, shaped by the seismic social and political events of their time.
Jacqueline Kent is a biographer, book editor and literary critic who was born in Sydney,and grew up there and in Adelaide. A Certain Style, her biography of pioneering book editor Beatrice Davis, won the 2002 National Biography Award and the Nita B. Kibble Award, and was shortlisted for six other prizes. Her memoir Beyond Words was shortlisted for the National Biography Award in 2019. She is the author of The Making of Julia Gillard, the only full biography of Australia’s first and only woman prime minister. Other biographies include An Exacting Heart, the story of pianist and social activist Hephzibah Menuhin, and Vida: A Woman for Our Time, about pioneering Australian suffragist Vida Goldstein. Her most recent book is Bonjour, Mademoiselle! April Ashley and the Pursuit of a Lovely Life, published in September, 2024.
She has written young adult fiction and contributes to Australian Book Review and the Australian Dictionary of Biography. She holds a Doctorate of Creative Arts from the University of Technology, Sydney.
Book and pay:
Members, you can book for yourself and a friend at member pricing, if purchased at the same time.
Workshop: Members $40, non-members $55
If you have a Workshop Voucher, please email Julie Thorndyke, Workshop Coordinator, to advise your intention to attend.
Literary event: Members $25, non-members $40
Discount for full program (Workshop and Literary Event) when booked together:
Members $60, non-members $85
By Credit card: https://www.trybooking.com/DCRVP
or by Direct debit:
The Society of Women Writers NSW Inc
BSB: 062 018
Account: 00950433
Code: VM
Email Amanda and include
your name, receipt number and date of event
Zoom ($10) will be available for this function – please click here to book: https://www.trybooking.com/DCRUZ