Our next event

Special thanks to Flinders University student Courtney Cullen for designing this poster and flyer.

The Night Sparkled with New Stars

Speakeasy’s first public event was a huge success! Flinders University students, staff, members of the Adelaide writers’ community and the general public came along to the spoken word event, where creativity was fostered in a supportive environment, at the Wheatsheaf Hotel on April 14th. All who spoke at the public event were astounding. The seven Flinders University students invited to showcase their talent at the Wheatsheaf after their stellar readings at the campus event last year were; Phillip Kavanagh, Tom Drahos, Amy Summerton, Amanda Williams, Jaqueline Rochow, Dennis Wild and Ronny Platt. These readers were complemented by three special guest headliners: Lisa Hannett, Clementine Ford and Amy T Matthews (winner of the 2010 Adelaide Festival for Literature Unpublished Manuscript Award). In the ten minutes allocated, each reader delivered an excellence in their voice and kept the audience entertained. Stylishly dressed in a suit, Flinders University English and Drama student, Neil Philbey, did a wonderful job as emcee. For some of the students it was their first time on a microphone. But while nerves may have been high, they did not falter. I overheard many in the audience who were impressed by the quality of the writing, ideas and the clarity of the voices on the night. It was tremendous to be around a group of like-minded people where Flinders staff and students, friends and family all gathered to hear the spoken word for a gold coin donation. People drank and ordered pizzas. The atmosphere was friendly and relaxed. Co-directors of Speakeasy, Margot and Threasa, closed the event on a high note, giving credit to the other people who helped to organise the event. Speakeasy’s next campus event will be at: Flinders University refectory, next to the Scholar’s Bar, on Friday 28th May. The event will go from 3pm til 7pm. If you are a Flinders undergrad or Honours student interested in reading some Of your own creative writing in a 5 minute slot, please email your details to: speakeasy.flinders@gmail.com ~ Angela Darlington, Speakeasy reviewer .

Speakeasy at Flinders University recent articles and useful links

Flinders Journal Speakeasy article (see Arts page 8) http://www.flinders.edu.au/new-and-events-files/Flinders%20Journal%20April%202010.pdf Same article in Indaily http://www.indaily.com.au/default.aspx?iid=35557&startpage=page0000014 Footnotes Flinders University Creative Writing Bulletin Issue 1 Apr10 http://www.flinders.edu.au/ehlt/englishandcreativewriting/footnotes.cfm .

A special thanks to our photographer

Speakeasy wishes to express our gushing gratitude to Adelaide photographer Sofie Marsden for all her great shots of our event at the Wheatsheaf Hotel on April 14th. Thanks so much. Find Sofie at: http://twitter.com/deathinvogue

More about all our readers that night at the Wheatie

Jacqueline Rochow is a 21-year-old biotechnology student at Flinders University and her life is completely consumed by her two obsessions: science and fiction. She also has an interest in writing science fiction. Having finished his Bachelor of Arts in English and Drama, Tom is undertaking Honours in Creative Writing this year. Other than writing, his passions include music and the creative arts in general. He hopes to travel Eastern Europe and make millions after writing a vampire novel. He thinks that the Hostel franchise would translate well into a televised mini-series. Dennis Wild is one of our most recent creative writing students at Flinders and comes to us with a varied history of Spoken Word/Oral Tradition pursuits and accomplishments. His long time involvement in Anglo-Celtic folk music, particularly the singing of ancient ballads, led to the discovery and riches of Storytelling, his main interest being in world and wisdom stories. Over the last dozen or so years he has represented South Australia three times at National Storytelling conferences. His growing interest in poetry led to the release of his experimental spoken word CD titled ‘Both Sides Yesterday’ in 2005. The inspired graphic design and artwork of this CD was the brainchild of our very own Katie Cavanagh. The poem from this CD titled ‘Pillow Talk Unexpurgated’ was published in UQP’s anthology ‘Best Australian Poems 2007’. Since then Dennis went on to complete his poetry chapbook titled ‘Just North of Bewilderment’ which was launched in early 2009 at the ‘Two Fires’ arts and activism festival in Braidwood, New South Wales. Dennis has had varying successes and crashing failures in the noisy and irreverent Slam Poetry arena. As an A.C.T. state finalist he was flown to Sydney in December 2008 where he came fifth in the All Australia National Turbo-Slam Finals. He continues to experiment with poetic and other creative writing forms, both on the page and in performance. He will be one of the contributing poets at next weekend’s National Poetry Conference in our very own S.A. township of Goolwa.

Amy Summerton is a creative writing honours student who is using her thesis subject as an excuse to buy books she can't afford but has always wanted to read. When she's not attempting and failing at writing her own biography she can be found arguing as to why it would suck to date a vampire, writing a novel that keeps getting longer and more complicated, or lost somewhere in the depths of the public transport system with no idea where she is or where she's headed.

Amanda Williams has been studying at Flinders University for nine years, completing a BA in English and a Creative Writing Honours Degree part-time. The successful completion of her Honours Degree and thesis in 2009, a multi-genred investigation into women’s relational autobiographical fiction, has earned her numerous Flinders University prizes including a University Medal, the Ann Flaxman Prize in English, the Richard Conyers Prize for an Honours Thesis and an Australian Postgraduate Award. She has commenced a Masters Degree in Creative Writing this year, once again, concentrating on women’s autobiographical fiction, this time in the Bildungsroman tradition with research into the tension between autobiography and fiction, male and female Bildungsroman, memory and imagination, metaphor and metonymy, symbolism and semiology. She asks the question: ‘Is metaphor in memoir, in life, an alternate form of honesty or simply evasion?

After completing a BA majoring in History and English, Ronald Platt has undertaken an Honours Creative Writing course because he is trying to buy time until his dog finally learns Flamethrower, and he can embark on his very own pokemon adventure!

Phillip Kavanagh completed his Honours Degree in Creative Writing at Flinders in 2009. He has recently commenced his Masters Degree. His short play, Which Time, was awarded a certificate of commendation for the State Theatre Young Guns Playwriting Competition in 2009, and has since been produced as a radio play by the ABC. Another short play, The Man From The Bar, was performed at the Short and Sweet Festival in Sydney, and had its professional premiere as part of the 2010 Adelaide Fringe Festival.

Speakeasy at The Wheatsheaf

An update on our readers

Details for some of the readers who will be appearing at Speakeasy this Wednesday 14th April are below: Amy T. Matthews has published short stories in collections including Best Australian Stories, and been long-listed for the Australian/Vogel literary award. She has co-edited two anthologies of short stories and poetry and is the winner of the 2010 Adelaide Festival Unpublished Manuscript Award for her novel End of the Night Girl, to be published in 2011. Amy lives in Adelaide with her husband and children, and teaches at the University of Adelaide.

Clementine Ford is an Adelaide based writer and social irritant. She's obsessed with email. She looks terrible in hats. She hates My Space. She loves her parents. She cooks a mean tray of brownies. According to Sunday Mail reader 'Liz', if she just did something with her hair and fixed her teeth then a man or woman might bother looking at her and she could stop all this feminism nonsense. http://www.audreyapple.blogspot.com/ Lisa Hannett's short speculative fiction has been published in Clarkesworld Magazine, Fantasy Magazine, On Spec, Canterbury 2100 and Scary Kisses. She has stories forthcoming in magazines including Weird Tales, ChiZine, Electric Velocipede, Shimmer, and Midnight Echo; and anthologies including Tesseracts 14, Sprawl and Steampunk Reloaded. Her story 'On the Lot and In the Air' was on Locus Magazine's "Recommended Reading List" for 2009. She is a graduate of the Clarion South Writers Workshop. When she’s not writing fiction, Lisa teaches in the English Department at Flinders University, where she also hopes to complete her PhD in medieval Icelandic literature before she grows older than her subject matter. http://lisahannett.livejournal.com/

Speakeasy at The Wheatsheaf Hotel

Come to the Wheatsheaf Hotel on Wednesday night, April 14 for Speakeasy’s inaugural public reading event showcasing Flinders University’s creative writers. Hear some of Flinders University’s and Adelaide’s most talented creative writers including special guest Amy T Matthews recent winner of the 2010 Adelaide Festival for Literature Unpublished Manuscript Award.Bring a friend and a gold coin. Doors open at 6pm. For more information please email Margot McGovern & Threasa Meads at: speakeasy.flinders@gmail.com

Our first event!

Who says Friday 13th is bad luck? Sure, the day was a scorcher at nearly 40 degrees. And, yeah, there was a family of killer-ducks threatening to chase us out of the courtyard before the event got started. But a few glasses of chilled wine helped alleviate the first problem, and an active pre-schooler saved us from the second -- and once the readings began, all superstitious curses were forgotten. For over three hours, we were spell-bound by a wide selection of Flinders' creative writing talent. We heard travel narratives, life writing pieces, snappy humorous works, excerpts from novels, poems, works-in-progress, and so much more. Thanks everyone, for making our first Speakeasy event a huge success.

Sweet...

A great crowd on a hot night...

Set Three: Lauren, Natasha, Jacqueline, and Dennis

Set Two: Nedelin, Amy, Satu, Charles, Nadia, Tom, and Amanda

Set One: Hannah, Phillip, Kimberly, Jo, Malanie, Ronny and Darren