The Lord Mayor’s Creative Writing Awards 2020 sees the introduction of a new Feature category. The Feature category will change each competition, with the inaugural being Script/Play.
The Life Writing Award for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Writers will be awarded to an outstanding work focused on documenting, discussing or highlighting a uniquely Victorian story of Australia’s First People. This prize recognises the work of unpublished Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander writers and supports City of Melbourne’s ongoing commitment to promoting the richness of Indigenous culture and reconciliation.
Winning entries will receive a $2000 category prize. The overall winner of the Lord Mayor’s Creative Writing Award will win an additional $10,000. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are encouraged to apply for all categories.
The Lord Mayor’s Creative Writing Awards encourage unpublished writers living in Victoria and celebrate Melbourne’s status as a UNESCO City of Literature. The aims of the awards are to support and give recognition to unpublished Victorian writers and strengthen Melbourne’s status as a UNESCO City of Literature, and promote the City of Melbourne and its libraries as a place of ideas and creativity.
City of Melbourne Libraries are pleased to announce the judges for the Lord Mayor’s Creative Writing Awards 2020.
They are Andy Jackson, Barry Lee Thompson, Carly Findlay, Clem Bastow and Ellen Van Neerven.
This talented group represents a vast amount of experience and knowledge in writing. Each judge brings their unique and important perspective to the awards and reflects the amazing diversity of Melbourne. We are privi-leged to have them on board to find the next winners of the Lord Mayor’s Creative Writing Awards.
Andy Jackson is a widely published poet who has featured at literary events and arts festivals in Ireland, India, the USA and Australia, and co-edited disability themed issues of the literary journals Southerly and Australian Poetry Journal. His most recent book, Music Our Bodies Can't Hold, was shortlisted for the John Bray Poetry Award.
Barry Lee Thompson’s short stories have been published in Australia, the UK, and the USA. They have been recognised with many awards, including the inaugural City of Melbourne Lord Mayor’s Creative Writing Award. His book Broken Rules and Other Stories is soon to be published by Transit Lounge.
Carly Findlay is an award winning writer, speaker and appearance activist. She writes on disability issues for publications including the ABC, Daily Life and SBS. She was named as one of Australia’s most influential women in the 2014 Australian Financial Review and Westpac 100 Women of Influence Awards and is author of a memoir, Say Hello, published in 2019.
Clem Bastow is an action cinema and screenwriting researcher, Autism self-advocate and award winning cultural critic based in Melbourne, Australia.
Ellen van Neerven is an Aboriginal Australian writer and poet. Her first book, Heat and Light, won the 2013 Queensland Literary Awards' David Unaipon Award for Unpublished Indigenous Writers, the 2016 NSW Premier's Literary Award's Indigenous Writers Prize and was shortlisted for the Stella Prize in 2015.