We are very excited to announce that Festival Director Lisa Dempster has been invited by the British Council and Edinburgh International Book Festival to attend their Bookcase conference this August, but we need your help to raise $5000 to make it happen.
As one of only fifty literary experts to be selected from around the world, this is a great honour for Lisa and a real testament to the burgeoning reputation of the Emerging Writers’ Festival.
Taking place during the prestigious Edinburgh International Book Festival, the timing of this conference could not be better. A representative from the Edinburgh City of Literature attended the Emerging Writers’ Festival in May, and she was greatly inspired by the festival’s programming and engagement with writers, and has decreed that it should be a benchmark for Edinburgh and other cities of literature.
This visit to Edinburgh and her attendance at Bookcase and the Book Festival would enable Lisa to do what she does best – work to promote and create opportunities for Australia’s emerging literary talent.
While we are delighted to receive this prestigious invitation, the challenge for a small independent arts organisation like the Emerging Writers’ Festival is funding. Although the British Council have been generous in their support, the real costs of this trip fall outside the Festival’s very tight pre-planned annual budget. As such, the trip will not be able to go ahead unless we can gap a small financial shortfall of $5,000.
We are therefore requesting assistance from our network – that’s you.
If you would like to support the growth of the Emerging Writers’ Festival and help us to get Lisa to Edinburgh, please make a donation.
Your donation will be fully tax deductible and all donors will be thanked on our website.
You will also be able to follow Lisa’s journey, as she has committed to blogging every day on things of interest to the Emerging Writers’ Festival audience while she is in Edinburgh – a great opportunity to get an inside perspective on one of the world’s great literary events.
Vivienne Corcoran
Emerging Writers’ Festival Chair
Donations can be made via PayPal or you can send a cheque to:
Emerging Writers’ Festival, PO Box 21251, Melbourne 8011.
A tax invoice will be issued.