Free event: The Retrospect: Australian Women’s Writing – A Symposium
1.00 pm – 7.30 pm, Thursday, 3 November 2016 | Dixson Room, State Library of NSW
In collaboration with the State Library of NSW and the Sydney Review of Books, the Writing and Society Research Centre are pleased to present a one-day symposium on Australian women’s writing.
The symposium brings together leading scholars and award-winning writers from across Australia to register and explore the contributions and legacy of nineteenth-century Australian women’s writing.
Speakers will consider a variety of Australian female writers publishing throughout the nineteenth century, as well as the broad range of genres within which these writers worked, including poetry, science fiction, the short story, and crime fiction.
The symposium will also include a special session on women’s children’s literature and education both past and present in Australia with author and NSW Ambassador for the Stella Prize Schools Program, Emily Maguire.
Confirmed speakers include: Prof. Susan K. Martin, (La Trobe), A/Prof. Tanya Dalziell (UWA), Prof. Elizabeth Webby (USyd), Dr. Lucy Sussex (La Trobe) and Dr. Anne Jamison (WSU).
The symposium will conclude with a roundtable discussion to reflect on the ongoing influence and legacy of Australia’s nineteenth-century women writers.
The roundtable includes contemporary writers Fiona Wright, Jessica White and Maggie Mackellar, who will discuss their own recent re-encounters with Barbara Baynton, Rosa Praed and Ada Cambridge for a forthcoming series of retrospective reviews in the Sydney Review of Books.
Registration is free but places are limited. To register, please email: [email protected]
This symposium is part of a wider collaborative project on nineteenth-century Australian women’s writing and has been funded by the State Library of NSW’s Nancy Keesing Fellowship, as well as a Western Sydney University Research Development Grant. In-kind support has also been generously provided by the Writing and Society Research Centre.
To view a draft program, visit the symposium website.