DOES Australia need a new fiction award that encourages "positive" portrayals of women and girls? Or is it an outdated gesture in a post-feminist culture rich with female authors, characters and readers?
The literary community had both reactions to the Barbara Jefferis Award, which is launched today by the Australian Society of Authors.
Offering prizemoney of "at least $35,000", the award will be given annually from next year to "the best novel written by an Australian author that depicts women and girls in a positive way or otherwise empowers the status of women and girls in society. The novel may be in any genre and it is not necessary for it to be set in Australia."
Among the country's most generous book awards, it is funded by a $1 million bequest from Jefferis's husband, John Hinde, the ABC film critic who died last year.
Hinde has also funded a new film script award for the Australian Writers' Guild.
Rosalind Hinde, a Sydney biologist, said her father established the Jefferis Award in his will with "the very clear and strong intention to honour my mother's writing, her feminism and her devotion to other writers".
Jefferis, who died at the age of 86 in 2004, wrote nine novels, as well as radio dramas and other programs.
She was a passionate member of the Australian Society of Authors for 40 years and became its first woman president in the 1970s. In 1986 she received the Order of Australia for services to literature.
Writers including Tom Keneally, Helen Garner, Frank Moorhouse, Gavin Souter, Rosie Scott, Gerald Murnane, Anne Deveson and Brian Castro expressed admiration for Jefferis and Hinde and their gift.
While the society's committee is still to decide on its final value, the Jefferis Award will rival the Miles Franklin Award ($42,000) and the biennial Tasmania Pacific Fiction Prize ($40,000) as the country's richest.
"Hallelujah!" said the critic Kerryn Goldsworthy.
"I'm still an old-fashioned feminist girl and I think it's fabulous."
Apparently we should not be complacent about images of women in our literature. Elaine Lindsay, a feminist literary scholar, recently analysed 23 novels that won the NSW Premier's Literary Award for Fiction from 1979 to 2003.
While arguing it is not writers' duty to present affirmative role models, she found female characters held a narrow range of occupations, were suspicious of powerful women and had a high rate of nervous breakdown.
"Women who exercise influence in their own right remain the exception to the rule," she said.
While the Jefferis Award avoids restrictions on novels' settings or authors' gender, the challenge for the judges will be to define "positive" and "empowering".
"It does make it a bit difficult for the judges. It's a matter of what you can get away with," said the academic Elizabeth Webby. She has judged two awards with much-debated terms - the Miles Franklin Award for a novel about "Australian life in any of its phases", and the Kibble Award for "life writing" by a woman author.
Morag Fraser, a current Miles Franklin judge, said the Jefferis Award was "so broad you could get anything under it. It would have to be Robinson Crusoe not to qualify."
The Herald's chief book critic, Andrew Riemer, praised the award's generosity but said: "I don't like literary prizes being used for anything that can be seen as propaganda or a social agenda .
.. I would have been happier if it had set out to reward novelists' skill and imagination without attaching strings.
"
The novelist Emily McGuire agreed: "I don't like the idea of judging fiction based on its message. Fiction can often say the most when it doesn't necessarily show people in a good light or empower women."
One of my favourite books last year was Careless by Deborah Robertson, so I'm pleased to see it appearing on the 2007 prize lists.
Despite being Robertson's first novel, it was shortlisted against such books as Peter Carey's Theft for the Commonwealth Writers' Prize Best Book in the South-East Asia and South Pacific region, which was won this month by New Zealander Lloyd Jones's Mr Pip. Careless is also longlisted for the Miles Franklin Award and for the Orange Broadband Prize for fiction in Britain, where it came out in January. No doubt there will be more.
"The lists are an encouragement," Robertson says. "It means that in writing my second novel I am taking more risks." At 48, with a book of short stories, Proudflesh, that won the 1998 Steele Rudd Award, she is no novice.
But since studying under Elizabeth Jolley with her friend Tim Winton, she has taught creative writing at Murdoch University for a decade. Careless - three interwoven stories about grief, with a glorious little girl at its centre - sat "like an old iceberg" until she had a year off to write it.
Picador's Nikki Christer contacted Robertson after reading Proudflesh and was alerted by Winton to the coming novel.
She sobbed through the manuscript and bought it. "There's something of everyone's experience in the book," she says. "Deborah's a major talent.
" As Christer leaves Picador next month, it will be interesting to see if the partnership resurfaces.
It took an overseas scholar to write Water from the Moon: illusion and reality in the works of Australian novelist Christopher Koch. According to its author, the New Caledonian Jean-Francois Vernay, it is only the second published study of Christopher Koch's work.
Vernay did his PhD on Koch, whom he considers Australia's finest writer. (David Malouf, Peter Carey, Tim Winton and Helen Garner make up his top five.) He admires Koch as a "monomaniac" preoccupied with the themes of illusion and reality.
"His poetic style and blending of various genres make him quite a distinctive and refined novelist," says Vernay, picking out as his best the "palimpsest books" - The Year of Living Dangerously, The Doubleman and Out of Ireland.
Koch is neglected in Australia because "some of his opinionated responses ..
. appear as severe diatribes targeted at academics ..
. There appears to be a connection between the loveable writer and the successful writer in Australia."
Vernay's book is available from Cambria Press, a US academic publisher, which is planning a series on other Australian writers such as Malouf and Carey (see www.
cambriapress.com). He is also co-editing an international collection of essays on fear and protection in Australia.
Expressions of interest to fearozproject@yahoo.com.
Revisiting those "What was I thinking?
?" moments.
I could swaddle this intro in witty bon mots and all manner of adjectival beating around the bush, but I might as well come out and say it straight up:
Back when I was an impressionable young'un, I thought Gomez were the best thing to happen to a) me and b) music since sliced bread.
Yes, that's right, the noodly college rock jam band with two of the world's most annoying vocalists and a third who is so inoffensive as to become the musical equivalent of no-name brand "milk coffee" biscuits (and about the same colour, too).
What can I say? Clearly I was young, dumb and NOT full of cum.
Fortunately, in to paraphrase , I did get better, and I also know I'm not alone in this cringeworthy fate.
GQ recently ran a column detailing ten or so films given the critics' "Instant classic" status upon their original release; just one was judged to have stood up to its tag.
And bands are no different - mired in the excitement of a fresh release or the thrill of discovering something new, we quite often declare something to be the "best ever" or "my new favourite band."
We've all done it - you grow up, hear new stuff, become more attuned to the influences that birthed these temporary "best evers" and branch out, using them as gateway bands.
(Although I can't really say that Gomez led me anywhere other than into the fug of deep and harrowing embarrassment.)
So, in light of this blog's spirit of analytical nostalgia, I thought it a good idea to revisit some of my past "best evers" with a refreshed ear and an eye for youthful hyperbole, and see if I still agree with my more effusive former self:
Clem aged 16 or so: "This is the best song ever OMG!"
Y/N?
: Hell yes!
Clem in first year uni: "Whoa, this is totally spine-tingling and emotionally epic stuff. Do these guys have a fan club?
"
Y/N? : Nup. Good video but.
Clem tries rock criticism circa 2003 or so: "Clearly these guys are the future of rock'n'roll."
Y/N? : Probably not.
Clem at 15 or so, listening to Gold: "WTF is this? This is AMAZING! Mum, mum, listen to this song!
!"
Y/N? : Obviously, yes; in fact, I would go so far as to say that Gimme Shelter could be one of my favourite songs of all time (that's for another blog, though).
PS thanks to all the kind Noise Pollution regulars who offered their copies of the London Symphony Orchestra version of the song.
Clem in Year 9: "Wow, this video is so amazing and scary; Metallica are the best metal band EVER."
You get the picture.
So there you go; this is your Friday afternoon fun-times - what is the one (or ten) band (bands) you once foolishly declared the best ever, and which ones haven't lost their shine?
If you need me, I'll be the one out the back burning all the Gomez press clippings.
What happened to showmanship in rock?
Last night I went to see Jarvis Cocker at the Forum Theatre.
He played a modest set (seeing as he only has one album worth of songs, and - as he put it - "This isn't Pulp"), but what a set!
Cocker (the thinking woman's sex god) was resplendent in the same clashing corduroy ensemble gracing the of Jarvis and his exaggerated Clark Kent glasses, high-kicking, jiving, punching the air along to Black Magic's stomach-churning Crimson And Clover sample, reading to the audience from a visitor's guide to Melbourne ("Melbournians [have] a passionate love of Italian-style coffee", apparently) and talking about catching a tram to "Poo-haa-raan" (Prahran).
Every moment, from to "c--ts are still running the world" was heartfelt.
Every James Brown-meets-Mick Jagger move whip-cracked across the stage as though he'd put his finger in a socket; every word, whether it was "ta" or a philosophical dissertation on the dangers of texting on trams, felt compelling.
It's just a shame that showmanship seems to have fallen out of favour with most bands currently doing the circuit.
In fact, the Jarvis show itself was a tale of two showmen - Jarvis versus Thomas Mars of Phoenix.
The French pop band were excellent live, but it was their sound (and their stupefying light show, which almost had me convulsing) that was gripping rather than their presence.
Mars was effusive, continually thanking the audience - at one stage jumping into it, which at his stature was not a great idea for the people in the 'cheap seats' - but the modest frog couldn't hold a candle to Cocker's electrified nerd.
And while Cocker had a you-beaut lightshow, too, his stage presence would've lit up an outer-suburban scout hall.
Lord knows I've seen plenty of bands, and some of the ones known for their live presence tend to muddle "show" with "showmanship".
KISS is a perfect example: one of the most enjoyably ridiculous show's you're likely to see, but it's not so much about Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley these days (I seem to recall describing them at the time as 'arthritic racehorses') as it is the flash-pots and flying drum-risers.
The Darkness, at the slightly-incongruous-for-their-then-profile Corner Hotel, had to do away with their klieg lights and flying white tigers for their first Australian tour, and Justin Hawkins (here's , *sadface*) worked the tiny stage like it was Wembley Arena.
That's where showmanship is most enjoyable, to me - where a nobody band from Bum-Fuck, Nowhere works a suburban pub like it's a stadium. Of course, this technique gets right up some snobby noses, which makes it all the more enjoyable.
Two examples of this technique spring to mind for me, one now well-known, the other not so much.
The latter was a Wollongong band called (who had the misfortune of playing 's debut gig), whose frontman looked like Ron Jeremy's long lost cousin and spent the whole night straining at the seams of his abbreviated satin faux while lording over the crowd like Hell's version of .
The former example was, before the Capitol "deal" and the mad hype, Airbourne - who were then, as they are now, basically a prototypical AC/DC from the sticks - laying waste to Ding Dong in a flurry of "HELLO MELBOURNE!!
" and behind-head guitar-soloing. It was non-stop, coast-to-coast , but before Airbourne's presence was a given thing, it was thrilling.
For this technique to work, though, it has to be sincere and almost earnest - giving a Thursday night opening slot all the "Hello Cleveland" in the world won't convince me, if the only reason you're doing it is because you think you're top shit.
Many up-and-coming and/or hyped bands fall prey to this.
Even before they hit the Big Time, Jet would play with a world-weary ennui that only The Rolling Stones could reasonably carry off, if those old codgers weren't too busy still having fun. It was as booooring as Dingley's Finest's touchingTM .
Alas, as much as I live for showmanship in rock, I see too many indie bands who think we're going to lap up their boring half-hearted posturing and/or staring at the floor. A little effort would be nice - if you're shy, then magnify it until you're an ouch cube of nerves like early model . There's nothing wrong with a little performance!
(And that doesn't mean wheeling out the same foot-stomping, beer-spraying gimmicks every time.)
Tellingly, a lot of the showmanship in the music scene these days is coming from the female camp: Peaches and her cock clit rock superstar band; Juliette Lewis, picking up where Hawkins and Axl Rose left off, with her Licks; The Gossip's all hollerin', all vomitin' Beth Ditto.
And perhaps you've seen someone who has blown your gig-going brains out - whether they're playing stadiums or open-mic nights, who do you think has got mad showmanship?
Who do you reckon is the best ever?
Me, I'm still waiting for someone to match the sublime presence of one . Never has a performer so deftly combined macho bullishness with such a delightful feline knowingness.
Plus he looked good in a kilt - which is probably more than I could say for poor, skinny Jarvis Cocker, bless him.
The most important part of your last will and testament: musical direction.
"What songs do you want played at your funeral" is one of the oldest rock snob chestnuts in the book, but it was still enough to make my Mum exclaim "Oh no, Clem, that's awful" when she enquired as to today's blog topic.
Maybe it's a societal thing: we don't really talk about death, nor do we really like the concept, and most of its reportage is of the "OMG horrible" or untimely/tragic variety.
But it's quite often mundane and everyday, necessary - and inevitable. So, what better way to be at ease with the concept than to draft a proposed soundtrack for your final sending off?
Personally, I'd like to go old and sitting on the verandah of a beach-house somewhere; maybe get incinerated and chucked out at sea, maybe buried in Carlton amongst the foxes and the faded plastic flowers.
However in the event that a rogue elevator or malfunctioning straightening iron does me in tomorrow, let this list be at least a starting point for whoever's entrusted with the boombox at the ceremony.
PS I know that Monday Mix-Tapes are usually ten tracks' long, but given that at this stage I'm probably unlikely to be given an extended state funeral, six songs will do me for now. You are, of course, welcome to have a fully-orchestrated twenty-song opus for your funeral arrangements.
And When I Die was on a mix-tape my musically-switched-on and "groovy" (read: young-ish) aunt made for me when I was about 14, and the song stuck with me (possibly because it was written by Laura Nyro when she was just 17; fortunately BS T's version lessens any Dolly poetry effects her youth might've had upon the song's impact). It's not quite a New Orleans funeral big band, but it'll do; you could do worse than to rage against the dying of the light with the verve of David Clayton-Thomas. Could the musical director on the day could kindly edit out the "Here I go" jazz/funk workout, though, kthx.
Every funeral needs a shameless tearjerker, and being a musical theatre fan (and given that Six Feet Under has already "done" the And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going-as-funeral-song gag), why not this five-Kleenex weepie from the musical that got me into Sondheim in the first place, Into The Woods. It's inclusion would be less about my carking it than a song to cheer up the mourners a bit, or something like that. And at least it's not Send In The Clowns.
This is probably my favourite piece of instrumental and/or classical music ever, so I guess that qualifies it to send me off. Unlike Pachelbel's bloody Canon or something similarly overused, though, The Lark Ascending (in edited highlights form above) doesn't play for easy tears or a simplistic emotional response; in fact, it's not really a "sad" song at all, and thus perfect for moments of quiet contemplation at what a gaping hole I've left in the world LOLOLOL j/k.
Wham!
- I'm Your Man
My brother and I made a pact many years ago; if I were to die an untimely death (i.e. before he did), then he would arrange for this song to be played at the funeral (I think I got off better than he did, as his untimely-funeral song, as chosen by me, is Surfer Bird by The Trashmen).
I later read an interview with Blur's Graham Coxon in which he, too, expressed a desire to have I'm Your Man played at his funeral; he thought the irrepressible horn section and generally demented vibe of the song would be fitting as his coffin rolled away into the abyss. As with And When I Die, not quite a funeral big band, but whaddya gonna do? *shrugs in Rodney Dangerfield fashion*
Nearer, My God, To Thee
I'm torn between the "British" version of this hymn (as seen above in the wonderful Titanic flick of 1958, A Night To Remember) and the "American" version (seen/heard in James Cameron's Titanic, and the only emotionally resonant/restrained moment in the whole blasted film).
The British version - Horbury - is subtler and more mournful, but the American - Bethany - is a more efficient tear-jerker. Hopefully, either way, people will still think of it as "the sad song that those nice musicians played before they got swallowed up by the sea", thus increasing my funeral's pathos levels considerably.
Here it is, the time-to-say-goodbye-forever slash coffin-lowered-into-ground slash box-rolls-into-incinerator song.
Five minutes of reverential Bon Scott-led blues rock heaven to leave the ladies weeping and the men's lower lips trembling. The Beasts Of Bourbon do a fine live cover of the song, but there's no beating the AC/DC original for searing emotional honesty veiled thinly by Scott's inimitable impishness. They say Highway To Hell was his most "telling" work, and as much as I love that song's glorious, gurgling, full-tilt journey into Hades, for me it's all about the quieter, more considered Ride On.
As the song says, I ain't too old to hurry, 'cause I ain't too old to die, but I sure am hard to beat - and so is this song.
However you judge Suite Francaise as a work of literature, it is an extraordinary artefact of history. Written between the German invasion of France in 1940 and Nemirovsky's arrest and subsequent death at Auschwitz in 1942, it is an eyewitness's account of the impact of war on ordinary people.
Treasured by Nemirovsky's daughters, who survived but couldn't bring themselves to read the minutely written manuscript, it was published in 2004 for the first time in French and last year in English. Reading it is like opening a secret diary or having access to declassified documents.
As we learn from the fascinating appendixes - Nemirovsky's notes; correspondence from her husband, publisher and others after her disappearance; and the French editor's preface - the two parts of this book were intended to belong to a five-part epic which Nemirovsky hoped would match War and Peace in ambition and scale.
We can't judge it in quite that way, unfortunately. We can't even judge the two sections here as finished work because they are first drafts, which she clearly planned to change and tighten. But what well-conceived and -written first drafts they are!
Nemirovsky's brilliance lies in sticking to scenes where the daily lives of the French and their occupiers intersect. All the military action is offstage. In fact, if you didn't already know a little about the progress of the war, the collaborationist politics of and the later horrors of the concentration camps, you might be at a loss about the background to these stories.
I have never read before about the flight of French (or any other) citizens from the encroaching army. It is a vivid but brutal depiction. The emotions provoked among the victims are in general not attractive: disbelief, fear, complacency, cowardice, selfishness, even cruelty to others in the face of threat to oneself.
Everyone is pragmatic. There is the banker who abandons his loyal employees in favour of his mistress; the mistress who uses sex to survive; the author who uses his fame; the rich bachelor who lives for his porcelain collection; the priest who dislikes his orphan charges and dies at their hands.
Nemirovksy is unsentimental and mocks most of her characters - especially the wealthy - for their unheroic attitudes.
She highlights the ingrained French class system and the gulf between workers, bourgeoisie and nobility. Can anyone be as superficial and ghastly as the Mayor's wife, who thinks: "..
.these German officers were cultured men, after all! What separates or unites people is not their language, their laws, their customs, their principles, but the way they hold their knife and fork.
" Yes, I suppose so.
I found the almost universal unpleasantness set me at a distance from the story. I was surprised that someone writing as these events unfolded around her could be so cool and cynical.
I understood better when I read what Nemirovsky herself had been through at the hands of the Russians, the Germans and even her own family. How could she see good in any human being? I also felt that complaints about her were unjustified, at least in the context of this book.
As far as I can see, she judges everyone with equal toughness and no one in Suite Francaise is explicitly Jewish - perhaps because she could see how dangerous it would be to criticise Jews as Nazism rose against them.
But I failed to feel for most of the characters or even to remember them clearly as individuals after I'd finished reading. Of course, I also had to look at myself and admit I would probably not have been braver or more noble than any of these people under such circumstances.
Nemirovsky seems harder on the French than on the Germans. All those nice young German soldiers billeted with French families, politely addressing their "hosts" and falling in love with the daughters paint a rosy picture. As shown in the second part of the book, set in an occupied village, they seduced the French, who were willing to accept any conditions that allowed them to pretend life had not changed.
It is chilling when you know what was to come (which Nemirovsky suspected but could not fully know until she experienced its worst).
There are some wonderful stories wound through the bigger picture. I particularly enjoyed the story of Cecile, in love with a German soldier while her husband is away but willing to hide one of the village's men who has been betrayed by his own people and pushed into shooting dead another German.
The complexity of the situation and of her feelings is finely wrought.
Andrew Riemer, the Herald's chief book critic, about the musical structure of this book. The symphonic idea is a grand one and, with editing, would no doubt have worked well to blend all these stories into a historical epic.
For me it was at times a bit slow - the aristocrats drifting around their mansions, the polite banter with the Germans, the unconsummated flirtations - when we know what drama was occurring elsewhere. I wish Nemirovksy had been able to slash passages as she hinted in her notes.
But her small observations and precise language are the work of a clever, uncompromising writer.
I admired her willingness to kill off the priest - "in water up to his waist, head thrown back, one eye gouged out by a stone" - and the carelessly rich and drunk Charles Langelet - "The car's fender had shattered his skull. Blood and brains spurted out with such force that a few drops landed on the woman who was driving" (who, in a neat coincidence, is Arlette, the above-mentioned mistress). Melodramatic, even possibly deserved in the case of Langelet, but such banal deaths at the hands of their own countrymen put the violence of war at an ironic distance.
If we don't die one way, we will die another.
The overall theme of the book is well summarised towards the end when anyone harbouring the murderer of the German soldier is threatened with execution. Tension and suspicion rise on both sides.
"War...
yes, everyone knows what war is like. But occupation is more terrible in a way, because people get used to each other. We tell ourselves, 'They're just like us, after all,' but they're not at all the same.
We're two different species, irreconcilable, enemies forever."
I can't say I loved Suite Francaise as many others have, and as I loved other books we've discussed. But I certainly admired it and am pleased to have read it.
How did it affect you?
Tom Keneally is commuting to the US this year. In December in Tulsa, Oklahoma, he will receive the 2007 Peggy V.
Helmerich Distinguished Author Award. Until a phone call came "out of the blue", Keneally had not heard of this $US40,000 ($53,500) award for "internationally acclaimed authors who have written a distinguished body of work and made a major contribution to the field of literature and letters". But he is delighted to join previous recipients - mostly American - including John Updike, Toni Morrison, Saul Bellow, John le Carre, Eudora Welty, Norman Mailer, Margaret Atwood, Joyce Carol Oates and John Grisham.
In May he will be in Washington, DC, for the opening at Theatre J of his play Either, Or, based on a real-life German SS officer who bought chemicals for use on humans but assuaged his conscience by becoming a whistleblower. "A lot of us are in a situation where institutions preclude us from choosing absolute good," Keneally says.
He has been rewriting since the play was workshopped in Washington last year and hopes it will find an Australian venue.
"Whatever happens, I hope to die a slightly better playwright." No doubt he'll be back in the US next year for publication of his novel The Widow and Her Hero, declared his best in many years by Andrew Riemer in these pages last week.
On the homefront, Keneally turned his talent last week to writing a limerick for his urologist after having "a little procedure".
By the time he left hospital the nurses were reciting it and Keneally agreed to share his treasure with Undercover. Watch out, Les Murray.
Would treat people's privates at parties.
And helps pay for the Maserati.
Patrick White Day at the on Friday is a chance to see some of the collection bought by the library last year. Nicholas Pounder, the dealer who advised on the purchase, favours some mundane items that reveal the writer as mortal: a letter of encouragement from his London housekeeper when he was in New York trying to find a publisher and a file of "frugal" recipes.
There are early poetry and journal fragments that show the development of his style and correspondence with directors during his late theatrical renaissance.
"The scale and provenance [of the collection] are unlike anything else I've ever encountered, alongside the belief that he destroyed everything," Pounder says.
He joins White's biographer, David Marr, and scholar Elizabeth Webby for an afternoon seminar at the library in Canberra.
The day ends at Old Parliament House with a dinner based on White's recipes. See www.nla.
gov.au or phone 6262 1271.
When you're sick, you drift into very comforting "same old, same old" patterns. You don't want anything new or exciting, you just want your favourite meals (pulped, if necessary), reliable movies - and, in my case, music that takes you back to a time before work stress, loan repayments or letters to comply regarding rogue wheelie bins at the front of your house (true dinks).
And nothing says "you'll be okay" to me like a glass full of ice-cubes, a plate of chopped up fruit - and .
Sadly, kittens, as Madam Noise Pollution is currently, today you'll have to join with me in enjoying one of my favourite "I'm sick and I want to watch ____" moments while I lie in my charnal house groaning: AC/DC playing Baby Please Don't Go on Countdown in 1976:
While I'm obviously too young to have seen it "for reals", I have many fond memories of the twilight years of Australia's greatest music television show, and was introduced to a good deal of what would later become my "favourite ever" songs via the show.
And seeing as have started trotting out vintage Countdown gold over the weekends, now seems as good a time as ever to sit around reminiscing like the bunch of (real and honorary) old farts we are here at NP and discuss our golden Molly memories.
Further to that, how about other Australian music television efforts? What were your favourites, and the pick of the new bunch? I was a James Valentine on The Afternoon Show back then and am a huge fan of anything Channel [V]'s touches.
Internationally, I'm a sucker for a good VH1 countdown, too, particularly if the droolworthy is one of the talking heads or it features anyone whose title is 'Metal Expert' or 'Celebutante'.
So, go forth and bicker - I'll see you on the other side of the tunnel of light when I am resuscitated for Monday Mix-Tape.
Goodbyyeeee!
Drag out those sheep jokes, Brendhan Lovegrove blogs live on smh.com.au from noon on Friday March 23.
In the meantime, read his explanation of why size does matter.
I am a 35-year-old comedian from NZ. I am in Australia to perform in the Sydney Cracker Festival at the Comedy Store and in Brisbane at the Sit Down Comedy Club.
I have been a comic for over ten years working all over the world, but for the last five years, mainly in Britain. Last year I performed on Rove Live and Stand Up Australia.
I do find I get a lot of sheep shagging heckles but, to be fair, if you've ever seen the Prime Minister of NZ, Helen Clarke, you will understand why we shag sheep.
I'm also very proud of the fact that NZ was the first country in the world to declare war against Germany in World War 2, even before England. Why? because we are 12 hours ahead.
Australia is only 10 hours ahead, which means that for two hours in World War 2, NZ was completely alone at war with Germany. That must have freaked Hitler out.
We do OK for a small country.
We only have four million people. China has a billion. Actually, China has one billion three hundred and eighty five million people.
By saying there are a billion people I'm disrespecting three hundred and eighty five million people, which is the population of the United States.Having four million people, NZ wouldn't even be the size of a village in China. We would be the amount of people waiting at the lights to cross the road.
Whenever I'm overseas and people ask, "Where are you from?" and I say, "NZ", if they were to ask what the population was in NZ and I said "zero", I'd still be three hundred and eighty one million people closer to the truth than saying there are a billion people in China.
Brendhan performs at the Comedy Store, Moore Park from Tuesday to March 31.
Tickets $15-$29.50. Phone 9357 1419.
It's rare to see a film-maker and his stars being asked something as provocative during a public Q and A session as "Where are all the women in the film? Are you guys gay?''
after a packed screening of the new Australian documentary at the last week.
One woman asked the Abberton brothers - , who directed the film with , and , who stars in it: "Aren't you just cashing in on a cold-blooded murder?''
Their response to the first question was that the central character in their documentary is female - Ma, who raised the Abbertons when their own family disintegrated in Housing Commission Maroubra. But, yep, there were many female surfers at the beach who weren't included in the film.
To the second, they pointed out the courts acquitted Jai, another brother, who shot standover man Tony Hines in 2003. That infamous case - certain aspects of it anyway - features in the doco about the hard-core surfers known as the Bra Boys.
As well as appreciative or at the very least curious audiences - judging from that Randwick screening - it's a film that seems to have won the respect of many critics.
The Herald's described Bra Boys as compelling and likened the Abbertons to the Kelly gang for their a sentimental attachment to family, hatred of the police and distrust of anyone outside the tribe.
"You may not come out liking them but the film gives an extraordinary insight into the aggressive culture that formed them," he wrote.
On the ABC's , Margaret Pomeranz was similarly enthusiastic.
But The Sunday Telegraph's Paul LePetit was more brutal, calling it "neither a successful surfing film nor an unblinkered documentary''.
For my money, it's no surprise the film has opened strongly, raking in $424,000 in less than a week in just 47 cinemas.
It's a real inside look at a slice of Sydney life.
While there are plenty of contradictions, Bra Boys is an entertaining doco that becomes absorbing during the murder trial.
Like the questioner at the Q and A session, I wondered where the female surfers were and how they fitted into the Bra Boys ethos? I wondered about the anti-police sentiments and how that would influence a young audience who see Koby in particular as an idol for his big wave surfing?
I accepted the legend-making and one-sided perspective as a trade-off for seeing inside a world with its own values and rituals that is closed off to the rest of Sydney.
Like Kenny, Bra Boys shows an old-school Australia. But this one is much rawer, more aggressive and no stranger to such social problems as violence, parental neglect, racism and drugs.
In its first week - or very soon afterwards - it is expected to break the record for an Australian documentary in non-IMAX cinemas. has held that record for almost 20 years with $614,000.
It's a rare Australian doco for screening in multiplexes.
As all the questions above suggest, it's also a film that has people talking. And, intriguingly, the distributor's says Bra Boys has been drawing crowds as far from the beach as Castle Hill and Liverpool.
What did you think of Bra Boys?
And what sort of insights did it give you into the surf tribe?
The 1970s is often seen as the golden age of Australian theatre, the time when we finally shrugged off our cultural cringe. But what has happened in the decades since?
And where is Australian theatre heading?
A little over a month ago I found myself sitting in the theatre with my heart slowly sinking. I had begun to realise that the new Australian production that was being premiered that night was a turkey.
I wasn't in a tiny upstairs room in a Newtown side street but the main stage of the newly renovated Belvoir Street theatre. The play was Stephen Sewell's The Gates of Egypt.
I won't pretend to review this play .
The Sun-Herald's Jason Blake, who scores his reviews, gave it 5/10.
What became apparent to me was that the play - a kind of Passage to India via the pyramids - was insufficiently developed. The supporting roles were a series of caricatures so unsympathetic they would make Kath and Kim look endearing.
And the lead was an old biddy who was so confused about life she found it impossible to enunciate what it was she was looking for.
Clearly a great amount of work had gone into a play that just wasn't ready to be seen by an audience.
This was an even greater disappointment given the relatively few new Australian productions we get to see each year.
And it got me wondering whether Sydney's theatres provide sufficient development time and money for new Australian works.
So I sent out a questionnaire to our three mainstage companies - STC, Company B Belvoir and Griffin (Stables). Here it is, with their responses.
Let me know what you make of it.
Do you have a policy on the percentage of Australian playwrights you present as part of your mainstage program?
Company B: No formal policy but there is a definite strong impetus in the programming to include new Australian work and indigenous Australian work each season.
STC: No, no policy. We endeavour to serve the theatre as best we can and certainly STC believes that producing the work of local writers is a vital part of that vision. But we wouldn't seek to be limited to a percentage.
We would seek to have works using Australian writers in our seasons. We endeavour to programme at east one play from the Australian canon, contentious as that term might be, as part of the conversation that is our theatre. E.
g. Don's Party, A Hard God, The One Day of the Year, The Season at Sarsaparilla, Morning Sacrifice. Since Robyn Nevin has been at the helm the proportion of work by Australian writers in the subscription season has ranged from 64 per cent in 2001 and 2002 to 25 per cent in 2006.
The variability is a reflection of the unpredictability of having apposite plays available. In her time at the company the average proportion of works by Australian writers in her subscription seasons has been 47 per cent.
Griffin: Griffin prides itself that it is the only company in NSW that is dedicated to the production of new Australian work.
All mainstage shows at Griffin are new Australian plays. This accounts for five new full-length works this year, plus seven short plays. One of this year's four Stablemates productions is also a new Australian play.
How many new Australian plays are programmed in the current mainstage season?
Company B: Five out of eight plays this season, Snugglepot Cuddlepie and Little Ragged Blossom ( John Clark, Doug Macleod and Alan John, The Gates of Egypt (Stephen Sewell), Parramatta Girls ( Alana Valentine), Real Estate ( Casey Bennetto), Toy Symphony ( Michael Gow).
STC: Three: The Art of War, Troupers and Riflemind, plus one new Australian translation of a non-English language play.
(Tales From the Vienna Woods).
Griffin: All mainstage shows at Griffin are new Australian plays. This accounts for five new full-length works this year: Tommy Murphy's Holding the Man (actually a revival from the 2006 season), Daniel Keene's The Nightwatchman, Ian Wilding October, Wesley Enoch's The Story of the Miracles at Cookie's Table and Katherine Thomson's King Tide.
Plus a commissioned series of seven short plays on a theme entitled The Seven Needs.
What is the average gestation period for a new Australian play from commissioning to performance?
Company B: There is no average period.
some are in process for a few years such as the forthcoming Alana Valentine play - Parramatta Girls, while other such as The Gates of Egypt by Stephen Sewell are completed in a much shorter time frame. The development period is however long it takes to get the work to the highest quality and to the writer's satisfaction. Recent commissions in the downstairs season are developing a different trend in the developing of work where the period from commission to production is shorter because of the collaborative nature of the work.
STC: Eighteen months. But averages are deceiving. One quickly-produced play can skew the figures.
If needs be, we'll hold off for a couple of years, particularly over issues of balance within a season.
Griffin: The turnaround time between initial commissioning and final production can be as little as a year (Nailed) or much longer. Parramatta Girls, which has ended up being part of this year's Belvoir season, has been four years in gestation.
What is the average rehearsal period and are other resources (eg dramaturges etc) generally employed?
Company B: Six weeks including tech week and previews. Company B has a literary manager who is hands-on with productions.
Also Artistic Director Neil Armfield and Associate Artistic Director Wesley Enoch have extensive knowledge and experience with new work and are very invloved with the process. There is also open discussion of development within the company and these fulfil the role of the dramaturg.
STC: Six weeks.
Dramaturges, readings, workshops are all used, as seen fit by the writer and the Artistic Director.
Griffin: Each production is rehearsed for six weeks. The involvement of the playwright in the rehearsal process is up to the individual playwright.
What other initiatives (competitions, play readings etc) does the company undertake to promote Australian play writing?
Company B: 1. The Phillip Parsons Young Playwrights Award- awarded to a playwright under 35 each year.
3. B Sharp Season- B Sharp is a unique partnership between Company B and small independent theatre teams. B Sharp's aim is to support developing theatre practice and showcase fantastic independent theatrical works in a nurturing mainstream environment.
B Sharp productions reflect the diversity of this sector, presenting new Australian works, re-invented classics and cutting-edge contemporary international writing B- Sharp this year has become an engine room for new Australian work
4. Boiler Room - A B sharp initiative created to give six directors the opportunity to work under the mentorship and guidance of Company B staff including B Sharp Director Lyn Wallis and Literary Manager Eamon Flack, developing works for the the season. The Boiler Room 'Six' and B Sharp embark on a process of sourcing, reading and connecting with scripts and concepts that will form the basis of the six directors' future independent productions.
Boiler Room Directors Tanya Denny, Jospeh Couch and Lee Lewis showcased their work as part of the 2006 B- Sharp season
STC: We have usually around ten writers on commission at any given time.
Our education season incorporates workshops and staged presentations of Australian plays as they relate to the school curriculum, e.g.
our current production of Matt Cameron's Ruby Moon, or our Australian Drama schools workshops. In this way we serve Australian writing with younger and emerging audiences.
wharf2loud continues to produce both full-scale productions of new Australian plays e.
g. Self-Esteem, and to workshop ten pieces of theatre through the 'Push' system. But is should be noted that one of the hallmarks of the Push idea is that it doesn't follow the 'find a playwright, commission a play, find a director, stage a reading' model.
Teams of theatre practitioners are brought in to work the material. This is in acknowledgment that the location of theatrical imagination doesn't lie exclusively in the mind of the playwright. A strong Australian theatre needs simultaneous development of all aspects of the craft, not just writing.
This is why we have the Patrick White Playwright's prize in conjunction with the SMH, but we also have a Richard Wherrett Fellow, in acknowledgment of the need to in some way help aspirant directors develop their skills. Or why we have a resident designer programme. When you look at the relative resources devoted to playwrights compared to directors or designers, there's a striking imbalance.
Griffin: Several resident playwrights are brought into the company each year. They get to meet with each other and the artistic director over the course of the year, and to develop a work for production - though not necessarily at Griffin.
Searchlight is a workshop week at Griffin for works in development.
Each year the company calls for entries and the audience get to vote on the winner, who gets a small cash prize towards the development of their work.
The Griffin Award is a more substantial prize, amounting to $10,000 annually. Ian Wilding is a two-time winner, whose was most recently awarded for October, which is playing as part of this year's season.
Again, it is not a requirement that winners have their works produced at Griffin.
So there you have it. I must say that I was quite surprised at the depth and breadth of theatre activity directed to new Australian productions in Sydney.
I guess they can't turn up a winner every time. And if even occasionally we get to see a beauty like Holding the Man, then in my book it's been worth it!
How many music festivals is too many?
Back , not only did we have to lick road clean with tongue, those were the days when the Big Day Out was such a, well, big deal that it was like Christmas - you waited for it all year, drew up wishlists, then finally the day came around and you got way too drunk, wore all your new clothes at once, got a bit sunburnt and headachey and were felt up by randoms in the crush to get a beer.
And then, when I was "old" (read: smart) enough to know about it, joined the fray. I went through a period of jetting up to Sydney for Homebake, and in an adult contemporary moment attended the now defunct Melbourne International Music Blues Festival, but that was about it. Two festivals a year was about as much as I could handle.
But these days it seems every other weekend offers a fest of some kind - from to - and what with prices going spazmo, scalpers getting away with bulk ticket nicking/distribution and bands refusing to do sideshows, are festivals the way of the future - or are they a force that must be stopped?
I'm not sure either way. On the one hand, there's the stance that a wide range of music festivals means our music scene (or at least our love of music) is in full effect and can support regular massed gigs - regular festival sell-outs are testament to this.
Festivals also bring artists "to town" who might not have otherwise bothered visiting (the classic artists' chestnut "It's too faaaaaaar" still reigns supreme); the foaming at the mouth of local Pixies fans over that band's V Festival slot is a prime and recent example.
However if you're a young band hoping to break into the massive potential audience that playing a festival offers (particularly a touring fest), good luck. So often local festivals trot out the same bands (The Living End, You Am I, Red Hot Chili Peppers) that it's hard for anyone else to get a look in.
And festivals are becoming more commercialised, too, what with branding, product tie-ins, Coca Cola advertisements about the wonders of music festivals (and let's not forget that panty-liners one, too) and Cosmo/Dolly features on what to wear in the mosh.
As for ticket prices, well, there are two schools of thought there, too. There's the camp that says that $100 or so for a variety of bands - for whom you'd be coughing up upwards of $60 to see on their own - is very reasonable.
Then again, if you're only going to see three or four and spend the rest of the day soaking up the atmos, $100 feels very steep indeed (as for the beer prices...
). Which brings us to my next point.
The recent brought to light the fact that people's motivation in attending festivals has gone beyond simply wanting a day or weekend of non-stop music; these days they are social events, too (or even more so) - a chance to party hard, drink hard, and catch up with your mates while music plays in the background.
But how many festivals can one extended community of punters take - are we teetering on the brink of having "too many"? Or is there no such thing as too many? What are your favourite festivals - and your least-favourite - and why?
*
Personally, I think I've had my fill of festy action - I'm old these days and my feet won't carry me for longer than four hours - or at least until someone can come up with a bill that combines Iron Maiden, !!!
, The Residents, Regurgitator, Courtney Love, S Club 7, Amy Winehouse, Madonna and Cold Chisel, and stages it in my backyard.
* I'm currently wallowing in migraine hell, so forgive the "think piece" today. Here's a .
Updated Thursday, March 22: Well, what an interesting conversation. More comments than on any other subject proposed by Undercover. Does that mean we prefer talking about the books we haven't read than those we have?
Negative reactions are more fun than positive? I'm impressed by the list of books you've even attempted and, of course, you've mentioned a lot you finished and enjoyed.
Our unscientific little survey had quite different results from the British one.
Lord of the Rings, which often appears at the top of "favourite book" lists, was our most unfinished. (I've never done more than dip in and decide repeatedly it isn't for me.) Others that lots of you gave up on were Zadie Smith's White Teeth (such anger!
), Bryce Courtenay's The Potato Factory (why that one of his?), Proust's Remembrance of Things Past, Patrick White's Voss, Umberto Eco's Foucault's Pendulum, Cervantes' Don Quixote, Gregory David Roberts's Shantaram, Herman Melville's Moby Dick, Joseph Heller's Catch-22 and Don DeLillo's Underworld. Most surprising to me was that several people hated Cloudstreet (isn't that meant to be Australia's most loved book?
) and a few more said they couldn't read anything by Tim Winton.
Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things divided you more than any other book (I'm on the side of the lovers), with almost equal for and against votes. And.
..drum roll.
...
the book that started this whole discussion, Vernon God Little by DBC Pierre, so far has had 10 people defend it passionately and only two who tossed it aside. I'd better try again.
Australians happily claimed DBC Pierre as one of us when Vernon God Little won the Man Booker Prize but do we want him now that a has found the novel is the most unfinished book in the country?
Thirty-five per cent of respondents said they couldn't get to the end of , which is as wild as its author. But J.K.
Rowling's Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, the fourth in the series, was surprisingly named as the second most-unfinished book and - not so surprisingly - James Joyces' Ulysses was third.
Most upsetting was the admission by 55 per cent of the 4000 people in the poll that they bought books for decoration. Admittedly I have a lot of books on my shelves serving just that purpose but it wasn't my intention.
I will read them one day...
.Vernon God Little is one that just hasn't grabbed my attention sufficiently and I gave up on Harry Potter after book one. Yes, I know, it's blasphemy.
But I did finish and mostly enjoy Ulysses. Of course, Molly's closing soliloquy is worth waiting for.
I used to make it a rule to finish books I'd started but with the number I have to "process" these days I do abandon a few.
Which books have you given up on?
Name and claim your favourite tracks of the past few months.
You've probably noticed that Noise Pollution's raison d'etre is somewhat, er, 'classic hits'. Given that I spent most of my teens listening to show-tunes, my hasty Music 101 edumacation continued up until fairly recently, so I'm still totally jazzed by Steely Dan et al.
It is my job to listen to new singles every week (as a singles reviewer and for the show I do with my pal) and so many pass my desk/ears that it all becomes a bit of a blur. However, obviously some stick - and that coupled with the fact that I've not yet done a "here's what I'm listening to already" entry on this blog means that today is the day you get to scrutinise my "Recently Played" list.
Yes, some are not from rightthissecond but I got into some of them way early and some of them way late.
Either way, here are ten songs that aren't pre-1983 and that I reckon are ace right now. Add your own at the end plz k thx.
I doubt there are many people out there who haven't heard Rehab by now, but here it is again for good measure - and because Winehouse is simply the best modern soul/whatever vocalist out there at the moment.
Joining Christina Aguilera in the Impossible To Sing Along With stakes, Winehouse's tone is instantly recognisable as her excellent scribbled tatts and as warm and slightly unnerving as a Jager shot. Having enjoyed parts of her debut, Frank, a few years back, I was pleased to see her beat her tabloid/drug/gym hell (booze hell still pending) and come back with a song as tight as this one. And, of course, there are many more on her album, Back To Black.
Steer well clear of the hateful TV Rock remix of The Others that is currently burning up the dance charts; the original is the best. Well, when I say "best", I still think - as I did when I first heard the track a few weeks back during a session - that the song doesn't know where it's coming from or where it's going, and I'm still not sold on Jack's voice, but that riff/bassline is killer.
Yes, yes, it's from last year, but in a fit of the sooky wombles I didn't really pay much mind to Kasabian's Empire, given that a) I was a massive fan of their debut album and b) everyone shat themselves over Empire and c) that sometimes leaves me prey to an attack of the I-liked-them-firsts.
So, sorry about that*, but on a recent 'business' trip to Sydney and half-passed out/naked in my fleapit hotel bed watching the TV on top of the fridge during a heatwave, I (re)discovered the greatness of Shoot The Runner. It may as well be a different band from the Bladerunner-sampling mentalists of Kasabian, but I don't really care.
One of my crueller friends tried to introduce me to the classically-trained boy wonder Mika earlier this year with the line "He's everything Justin Hawkins wishes he was", which is enough to turn me off anyone - but fortunately for that h8r I had already heard Grace Kelly and was already sufficiently in love.
The Freddie Mercury comparisons keep coming so I won't add to the mantra (and personally I find his music - not his voice - closer to Harry Nilsson's more colourful moments), but Mika certainly is the sort of pop-genius-showman that the music world - or at least this writer - is so desperately longing for. And there's nothing I like more than a bit of frailty in my male vocalists (see: Foreigner, John Waite, and so on), so Grace Kelly's "Why don't you like me" refrain totally mows my lawn. And cor blimey he ain't 'arf easy on the eye eh eh etc etc.
Brendan Benson makes me feel a bit funny in my pants (and no, I didn't shart) and there's nothing I like more than a righteous guitar work-out that sounds like it should be listened to in the back of a smoke-filled Bedford van with a mattress in it AND two orright looking blokes playing harmonised guitar solos at each other is just about the definition of Hot Sex in my book, SO, here is the best song off The Raconteurs' Broken Boy Soldiers while I go cool down.
Keep On is the kind of song that by all rights should have the music snobs pulling blank-faces and saying "Wha' happen?" as they roffle on about how amazing it is that a pop star (and a Pop Idol) could make good music.
Well, they don't deserve its charms and should return to their Peter Jackson Super Mild indie noise - Keep On is the sort of sophisticated out-and-out pop mentalness that JC Chasez whetted the collective appetite for with Schizophrenic. And, while we're getting heretical all over your face, it might actually be better. Young has always had a resolutely thin voice, but somehow that works here, like he's permanently teetering on the brink of orgasm/tears/fury.
The track is nothing short of incredible, melding syrupy strings with the kind of electro ripples that would make Robbie Williams spoof his rudebox, not to mention just about everything else including the kitchen sink. (PS I know that's a live version above; iTunes the real thing for the full effect.)
As the Sugababes begin their revolving-door-policy slide into relative irrelevance, the stage is set for the founding member they bullied out of the band (allegedly) to step up to the plate and pull the rug out from underneath their Louboutins.
Siobhan was the reason Overload was so awesome, and Don't Give It Up's glorious melding of Kate Bush and Alison Goldfrapp in a Smash Hits-ready package is pop heaven.
Somewhere along the line (ROFL) it became really cool to diss Silverchair; I think it was about the time Daniel Johns stage-dived and no one caught him (reportedly). And while he's still stuck, lyrically, in the Year 10 "absurdist" phase, musically he's grown immensely.
Diorama was a largely flawed record, but its highlights were close to spectacular (and translated particularly well live) - and if the excellent Straight Lines is anything to go by, Young Modern should be a treat and a half. It took me a few listens to come around to Straight Lines - at first I found it whiney, meandering and mostly forgettable - but by about the fifth or sixth repeat I realised it was anything but forgettable. Plus my Mum likes it, and given she seems to be light years ahead of her hermit daughter these days, I know when to sit up and take notice.
Bloody hell I don't care that it was released in late 2006, this is quite simply the most exciting song I have heard in the last two years. It's everything pop should be and everything modern rock wishes it was; the moment at 1:30-minutes (again, iTunes the real one; the video above is slightly edited) when it all drops out and then comes back twice as strong is the sort of giddy-making butterflies-in-the-stomach moment that is becoming a rarity in music of any sort. And any band that can get away with a video this wacky/zany/madcap and still sound like the best thing since sliced bread is a-okay.
And any band that can actually make me use the words "wacky/zany/madcap" without killing myself afterwards is pretty damn special indeed.
A diverse and "riveting" shortlist has been announced for the National Biography Award. On the list are three biographies: Arthur Tange: last of the mandarins, by Peter Edwards, about the late head of the External Affairs and Defence departments; Mr Stuart's Track, by John Bailey, about John MacDougall Stuart, the first European to cross the continent from south to north; Margaret Olley: far from a still life, by Meg Stewart, a portrait of the Sydney painter.
The other three books are memoirs or autobiographies: The Beginner's Guide to Winning the Nobel Prize: a life in science, by Nobel Prize winner Peter Doherty; East of Time, by the Holocaust survivor Jacob G. Rosenberg; and No Time for Dances, by Gillian Bouras, about her sister's mental illness.
Of the 55 books entered, three more are highly commended: Hoi Polloi, by Craig Sherborne; Will Dyson: Australia's radical genius, by Ross McMullin; and Bernard Shaw: a life, by A.
M. Gibbs.
The winner of the $20,000 prize will be named at the State Library of NSW on March 27.
Talk that The Los Angeles Times might kill its Sunday Book Review this month is a sign of tightening times for books and newspapers. The number of books pages will be cut from 12 to eight and combined with eight pages of opinion in a section that will move from the Sunday paper (circulation 1.2 million) to Saturday (fewer than 900,000).
Reduced advertising is one cause. Book publishers here have long argued that paid ads are an expensive and ineffective way to sell books, preferring reviews, interviews and author appearances. The bigger US industry supports books pages but is turning to more direct selling methods such as paying to have stacks of their books at the front of shops.
The LA Times's move leaves only five separate book sections in the US - in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune, the San Francisco Chronicle and The San Diego Union-Tribune - compared with about a dozen a decade ago. Only The New York Times recorded rising book ad revenues, of 10 per cent, last year.
Frank Wilson, literary editor of The Philadelphia Inquirer, which folded its book section into another in the 1980s, protests to The Wall Street Journal, "I don't understand why newspapers, when they want to cut space, they immediately think of depriving people who like to read.
"
Paul Bogaards, publicity director at the publishing house of Alfred A. Knopf, also puts the onus on newspapers. "Where are the ads in the sports section?
" he asks in the San Francisco Chronicle. "Consumers want credible reporting on books in newspapers."
The small Australian publishing company Finlay Lloyd was launched last year with one book, a collection of 15 essays with the ironic title When Books Die.
The venture based in country Braidwood, NSW, has proved a modest but encouraging success.
An initial print-run of 560 copies sold through 50 independent bookshops around the country, leading to a second printing of 300. "They're actually going out into the world.
The sales are going to finance the next 11/2 books," says one of the four owners, the novelist Julian Davies.
The next book, due out in May, is The Science Minister the Sea Cow: 13 essays on the nature of choice.
Contributors include the well-known, such as Michael Brissenden, Terry Lane, Paul McDermott and Paul Daley, and some new writers.
A number of bookshops have increased their orders from last time, and the first printing will be 1000 copies.
As reported earlier, New Zealand's Lloyd Jones has won the in the South-East Asia and South Pacific region for his novel Mister Pip. The Europe and South Asia Prize went to Britain's Naeem Murr for The Perfect Man, the Canada-Caribbean prize to Canada's David Adams Richards for The Friends of Meager Fortune, and the African regional winner is The Native Commissioner by South Africa's Shaun Johnson.
.
All four will compete for the Best Book prize in Jamaica on May 27.
Like Australia's Peter Carey, Canada's Alice Munro might have been expected to win in the Canada and Caribbean region.
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