Yarra Valley Writers Festival are celebrating authors and their incredible stories in a full day of live streamed talks, conversations and performances on Saturday 9 May 2020.
Due to COVID-19 playing havoc with our lives, the festival in its inaugural year will be presented digitally. We are not cancelling the Yarra Valley Writers Festival this May – we’re simply changing the way we share the stories. Our community needs to lead the way with physical distancing, not social distancing.
Book-lovers are invited to tune in from their homes and experience keynote speeches, performances and beautiful conversations from some of the brightest minds in Australian literature.
Programmed by playwright Hannie Rayson (Hotel Sorento, Inheritance) the Festival presents contemporary authors but in a new, digital format. “The way audiences experience art, culture and conversations has changed,” said Rayson. “For now. This is the time to be supporting Australian authors and celebrate writers who are prepared to challenge, enlarge and humanise our experience of the world.”
There will be a small charge to view the talks, which will enable the Festival to pay the authors. Writers and presenters featured in the live-stream include Tony Birch (The White Girl), Alice Bishop (A Constant Hum), Chris Flynn (Mammoth), Tom Griffiths (The Art of Time Travel), Vicki Hastrich (Night Fishing), Eliza Henry-Jones (How to Grow a Family Tree), Lia Hills (The Crying Place), Elizabeth McCarthy and Meg Mundell (The Trespassers).
Also featured will be Sean O’Beirne (A Couple of Things Before the End), Ailsa Piper (The Attachment: Letters From A Most Unlikely Friendship), Hannie Rayson, Angela Savage (Mother of Pearl), Jock Serong (Preservation), Michael Veitch (Hell Ship, Turning Point), Donna Ward (The Whole Bright Year), David Williamson (Don’s Party), Charlotte Wood (The Weekend) and more to be announced.
This first for the Yarra Valley, live streaming an entire day of creative activity, is being made possible by their partnership with the Yarra Ranges Council. Online viewing tickets will go on sale in early April. For program information, visit: www.yarravalleywritersfestival.com for details.
Image: Hannie Rayson – photo by David Connelly