2008 EVENTS

SCRABBLE - Emerging works inspired by an established master.

Paul Kelly is an Australian storytelling personality. His words and music are synonymous with our own. What better way to inspire emerging Melbourne wordsmiths than with the challenge of creating something new, and sampling from these well constructed lyrics.

“Ever since I started as a writer, if I’ve heard a line I like from someone else, I’ll put it in,” Paul Kelly on his album ‘Words & Music’, Sun Herald, 1998.

The festival’s scrabble challenge for 2008 has given Melbourne’s finest emerging wordsmiths one month to sample from the vast catalogue of singer, songwriter and iconic Melburnian Paul Kelly, to create a new work which will be performed at this exciting event.

See poets, spoken word artists, stand up comedians, ranters, theatre groups, sketch comedians, choirs and every manner of artists take to the stage with their original creative scrabble, all inspired by the brilliant songs of this 20+ year career in Australian music.

Scrabble is not to be missed; entertainment-packed and full of word plays, puns and reinvented genius...

Featuring Josh Earl, Beau Heartbreaker, Clementine Bastow, Xavier Michalides, Amelia Roper, Darlington Garage, Maxine Clarke, Melissa Martin, Tania Canas, A Lot of Bread, Alice White, Chay-Ya Clancy, Sean Whelan, Kate McLennan, Denton Arthur and more...

7.30pm Saturday 10th May
BMW Edge Theatre, Federation Square
Tickets $10 on the door (Free for Weekend Pass Holders)

Festive bar will be in operation!

Thanks to Universal Music Publishing Pty. Ltd, One Louder Entertainment and Paul Kelly.

THE HYPOTHETICAL - A la Geoffrey Robertson

CLOSING THE BOOK
Online publishing is everywhere, making it easier and easier for writers to reach audiences. Meanwhile, digital book publishing awaits its iPod. That’s it for books, then.

Publishing and media companies, big and small, scratch their heads and try to imagine how they're going to make money amid all this free flowing electronic information; writers don't know whether to be thrilled or disappointed as they merrily publish their every idle thought on blogs but habitually yearn for a book on the shelf with their name on it.

The world is flooded with words, but do any of them count?
How does an individual voice stand out on the floodplain?
Will standards sink?
And –will anyone get paid more than a trickle?

With Adam Ford, Susan Hawthorne, Damon Lockwood, Ron Pretty, Zoe Rodriguez, Martin Shaw, Margaret Simons.

Presented by Michael Nolan.

48-HOUR PLAY GENERATOR - Five slightly rehearsed readings!

Give five emerging playwrights two days to write five new plays, team them up with five established directors and a team of actors and what do you have? The rush of theatre- making madness that is the 48-Hour Play Generator

Featuring new work by some of Melbourne’s most exciting new Playwriting talent.

A hit last year and sure to be a sell out this

Presented by the Melbourne Dramatists, the 48 Hour Play Generator is the theatrical showcase of the EWF.

MELBOURNE DRAMATISTS promote Melbourne playwrights. It does this through providing the annual MD prize for new writing in The Melbourne Fringe Festival, running the 48 Hour Play Generator and presenting regular studio seasons of new work by its members. Since the closure of Playbox, the opportunities for production are fewer, but the product is stronger than ever.

7.00 pm Sunday 11th May
BMW Edge Theatre, Federation Square
Tickets $10 on the door (Free for Weekend Pass Holders)

Festival bar will be  in operation! 

ZINE FAIR - the flagship of the Emerging Writers' Festival is back, bigger and better than ever!

Want to meet, buy and trade with the best independent publishers, zinemakers & wordsmiths Australia has to offer?

Get down to the Independent Press and Zine Fair in The Atrium, Federation Square, on Sunday May 11th 12 noon-5pm.

There’ll be over 40 stallholders featuring the best literary magazines, small-press publishers, zinemakers, poetry publishers, postering experts and everything in between.

If that isn’t enough, you’ll be able to gaze at the wonder of a Comic in a Day as Melbourne’s most exciting comic writers create comics from scratch, right in front of your adoring eyes

Come join the Zinesters of Melbourne and pick yourself up something new and exciting as well as stocking up on all your old favourites