Writers on Writers: Tony Birch on Kim Scott

Join us for an evening celebrating award-winning writer Tony Birch’s new essay, Writers on Writers: Tony Birch on Kim Scott. Together with ABC RN journalist Daniel Browning, Tony will discuss this new work and reflect on the craft of writing.

On Kim Scott explores Birch’s perspective on the bestselling Noongar writer and author of the Miles Franklin Award-winning novels Benang and That Deadman Dance. Birch reflects on how Scott uses fiction as a pathway to find truth and describes him as a writer that interrogates the complex and messy frontier history of colonial encounters.

‘That Deadman Dance asks us not to consider who we were so much as who we could be, collectively, in the future.’ – Tony Birch

Publications from the authors will be available for purchase on the night via Readings Bookstore.

Registrations are free but capacity is limited! Book your spot now.

*This event will be livestreamed.

About Tony Birch

Professor Tony Birch is the Boisbouvier Chair in Australian Literature at the University of Melbourne. He is the author of four novels, five short fiction collections, and two poetry books. In 2022 his book, Dark As Last Night was awarded the Christina Stead Literary Prize and the Steele Rudd Literary Award. The book was also shortlisted for the 2022 Prime Minister’s Literary Award for fiction. His most recent novel is Women and Children.

About Daniel Browning

Daniel Browning is an Aboriginal writer, journalist, broadcaster, documentary maker and sound artist. Currently, he is the ABC’s Editor Indigenous Radio overseeing the longstanding flagship programs Awaye! and Speaking Out as well the language revival podcast Word Up. A visual arts graduate, Daniel also presents The Art Show podcast and is a widely-published freelance writer and cultural critic. His first sole-authored book, the genre-breaking anthology Close to the Subject: Selected Works is published by the Indigenous-owned Magabala Books and won the Indigenous Writing Prize at the 2024 Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards. A saltwater Goori from Fingal on the far north coast of NSW, Daniel belongs to the Bundjalung people of the Lower Tweed River on his dad’s side and the Kullilli people of south-western Queensland through his mum.

About Writers on Writers

In the Writers on Writers series, leading authors reflect on an Australian writer who has inspired and influenced them. Provocative and crisp, these books start a fresh conversation between past and present, shed new light on the craft of writing, and introduce some intriguing and talented authors and their work.

Published by Black Inc. in association with the University of Melbourne and State Library Victoria.

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