NPP

Congratulations to the winners of the 2009 Newcastle Poetry Prize.

OPEN SECTION
Patricia Sykes (winner) - To listen to Patricia read an extract of ‘Cassandra Vegas’, click here.
BR Dionysius (Highly Commended)
Tracy Ryan (Commended)
John Mateer (Commended)

LOCAL AWARD
Andrew Slattery (winner)

NEW MEDIA
Rob and Ben Walker (winners) Watch their winning entry here: Bibliophobia. Read Rob’s acceptance speech
Carolyn McKay and Nick Creecy (Runners-Up)

Download the full list of anthology poets here

A Mini Poetry Festival for 2009 Newcastle Poetry Prize.

This year the Hunter Writers Centre decided to have a bit of a mini poetry festival with the announcement of the Newcastle Poetry Prize winners at the end of November. The announcement itself always generates its own excitement, as evidenced by both the lead up phone calls we receive asking who has won, and the speed with which we get emails demanding the results appear on the web. This year those results took an extra day because HWC staff were busy arranging 3 other events over the weekend.

The prize-winner’s announcements and launch of this year’s anthology was again an immensely enjoyable and successful event. As Philip Salom, this years head judge noted in his speech, results are always fraught as ‘few win while more do not receive recognition’. Though with the anthology, unique in poetry competitions in Australia, 28 poets were represented this year in what has been described as ‘one of the most interesting and exciting litmus’s of contemporary Australian poetry practice’. One poet, who had previously been in the anthology and didn’t make it this year I think expressed the mood of most at the night– ‘ the results were really fair, a victory for poetry”. Patricia Sykes’ reading of her winning poem ‘Cassandra Vegas’ was an emotional and powerful occasion that had all enthralled by the power of the poem and her delivery. The New Media winner was a revisit by Rob Walker with his son Ben (having previously won in 2007 with his other son, Matt) and again showed the elegance and economy that can be achieved in this area of poetry (to view this, see links on our website). The presence of our committed continuing sponsors, University of Newcastle and Newcastle City Council, was appreciated by all with Vice Chancellor Nick Saunders’ words of the value not just of prizes but poetry in our culture being warmly applauded. It was a very relaxed event in the Newcastle Regional Gallery which each year provides an excellent venue for socialising, drinking and eating, listening to the countdown of winners, speeches and most importantly readings of the winning poems.

Following this event in the early evening, many of the throng walked a couple of hundred metres up the road to the Newcastle Conservatorium Concert Hall where at 8.15pm they sat down for the first public performance of SITESOUNDMIN(e)D, a project the HWC has been nurturing for nearly 2 years now. A new work of contemporary music theatre exploring site, history and the pluralistic voice, centred upon the James Fletcher Hospital site in Newcastle, commissioning new work from local artists is a goal of the HWC and we are pleased to be able to commission such an innovative piece as this. Teams of a poet/writer and a composer were each assigned a period of the history of the site and asked to respond and interpret it in whatever way they felt. Various directions were taken, from; personal response to the site, searching the historical archive - including personal statements and records, contemporary interviews and sourcing relevant music. The resulting concert, a 50 minute work that ranged across Indigneous song, traditional and new opera lieder, spoken word accompanied by string ensemble, multi character oratorio with ambient sound scape and piano, to country rock - it was a remarkable journey through time and varied poetic and musical styles. The unanimous response was that an important new work was premiered, or previewed, as we will be looking to moving the piece into a full theatrical production in the future. A recording of the event captures the remarkable event and will be available from the HWC soon with a chapbook of the printed poems (a list of poets and composers and their contributions are listed on our website).

While the next day a sleep-in would have been appreciated by us at the HWC, no such option was available, as at 10am Philip Salom was running a session on deconstructing the Process of the Poem – a sort of CSI forensic poetry workshop – simile smears, stylistic thumbprints and the like. Some 26 people enjoyed the one air-conditioned room in the Lock Up where they were challenged to look at poetry in a very different way. The buzz as they emerged survived even the blast of the midday heat - “very exciting, changes the way I will read poems, and write.” (M.L.).

An Authors Lunch followed in the old Exercise Yard of the Lock Up Cultural Centre, where the HWC has its offices. An expansive buffet with wine and lots of water allowed for an almost picnic atmosphere, which encouraged all the poets present who were in this years anthology to read their work. While it may have been hot everyone was more than happy to listen to the poets read their work. The Night Road, this years NPP anthology is an exciting collection, both to read and hear. Some selections of recordings of the readings are available on our websites, with selections from the previous nights concert and some photos of the various events.

All in all the mini festival was enthusiastically praised by everyone who attended over the 2 days for its quality and diversity – a picture of a strong and rich poetic practice. The scary part is we seem to have set ourselves a benchmark for next year, but with the continued strength and exploration of poets we feel sure we will come up with something to showcase next year as well.

To relive one of the pieces from SITESOUNDMIN[e]D, please go to ‘Sea In The Head.’