We are delighted to reveal our latest in the Write On Speak Out series of online publications. This year it is a special 30-year anniversary edition for Write On School for Young Writers.
Earlier this year, we tracked down writers across the world who had their first publication with Write On Magazine and buddied them with current students.
We were excited to find some of our past young writers who have gone on to publish widely across many genres including short stories, children's picture books, poetry, essays and journalism as well as contributing to the writing life in Aotearoa through editing, publishing, stand-up comedy, bookselling and tutoring.
Here are a few of the writers who kickstarted their careers with Write On:
Kathryn van Beek is the current Robbie Burns fellow at Otago University.
Kate Preece is an award-winning children's book writer.
Josiah Morgan at the age of 22 has four, and almost five, books to his name!
Amelia Kirkness is a poet and an editor with the new journal Symposia.
Jess Fiebig's first collection of poetry, My Honest Poem, was published in 2020 by Auckland University Press.
Ray Shipley is a well-loved local comedian, writer and bookseller.
Marissa Johnpillai is a poet, songwriter and community lawyer currently based in Narrm/Melbourne.
There are more!
The online project has 3 key components
Inspiration:
Our young writers used pieces published "way back then" as their inspiration to write something new. The new and older pieces appear together along with a recording by our young writer.
Connection:
You can read an interview between the young writer and their buddy. We loved seeing what stood out as treasured memories for our past pupils and also seeing which early writing experiences were pivotal.
Writing On:
We gave each of our past pupils the opportunity to share something more about their writing journey and to showcase a more recent piece of writing.
Write On Speak Out: Now and Then launches on September 21 2023 at 5 pm from https://www.writeonspeakout.org/
Thank you to Plains FM for support with the recording of the voices and to Copyright Licensing NZ for a funding grant that allowed us to archive 30 years of magazines and to develop this project.
The funding from Copyright Licensing NZ also went towards the redesign of our print magazine Write On 60: Memories and Milestones. It is a beautiful new design for our anthology. Copies are still available to order HERE
(c) Write On 2023
Comments