Templeberg shortlist announced
Eleven Australian authors have been shortlisted for the 2014 Templeberg Residential Writing Fellowship.
Now in its second year, the fellowship will send an Australia writer to Templeberg Villa(link is external) in Galle in the Southern Province of Sri Lanka for two- to four-weeks to work on a writing project.
The international fellowship is a philanthropic initiative of the Australian based owners of Templeberg Vila, Christopher Shields and Brent Carey. The winning writer will receive return airfare from Melbourne to Colombo in Sri Lanka, a 30-day tourist visa, internal transfer costs, accommodation, full board (all meals) and an A$1,000 spending allowance.
For the 2014 fellowship, the shortlisted writers are:
Aden Rolfe (NSW)
Chris Armstrong (NSW)
Christy Collins (VIC)
Gloria Meltzer (VIC)
Greg Woodland (NSW)
Lenny Bartulin (TAS)
Lisa Walker (NSW)
Lucy Nelson (ACT)
Richard Newsome (QLD)
Sophie Overett (QLD)
Virginia Jealous (WA)
“This is a truly national shortlist,” said Christopher Shields from Templeberg Villa, “Projects imagined and inspired by writers and poets from states as far apart as Queensland and New South Wales on the east coast and Western Australia right down to Tasmania.”
“There is also an eclectic selection of poems, short stories, new fiction and a performance piece,“ he said.
Several of the shortlisted applicants are previous winners of other leading writing prizes. Emerging poet Aden Rolfe has been shortlisted four times for the Judith Wright Poetry Prize and is a past recipient of the Dorothy Hewett Flagship Fellowship for Poetry. Greg Woodland is a 2014 LitLink and Varuna Writer’s Fellowship recipient and won Best Drama Manuscript in the 2005 National Literary Awards.
The international judging panel chaired by acclaimed Sri Lankan-based author Royston Ellis also includes Victorian travel writer Michelle Aung Thin, winner of last year’s fellowship Michelle Wright, and the owners of Templeberg Villa, Brent Carey and Shields.
The judges will select one winner, who will be announced at a special event hosted by Writers Victoria at The Salon on Tuesday 12 August.