Big Ideas
Melbourne Writers Festival’s celebrated Big Ideas program brings together the best minds from Australia and around the world. This year Kwame Anthony Appiah presents the Alan Missen Oration: Literature and Global Citizenship. Professor Marcia Langton discusses Indigenous Exceptionalism. Twitter journalist Andy Carvin will join an expert panel in Telling the World's Stories: What Happens when the Journalists Leave? Martha Nussbaum offers a critical examination of majority practices and how they apply to the minority in the John Button Oration: Cultural Pluralism in a Time of Fear. Acclaimed author of Stalingrad, Antony Beevor, will discuss his new narrative history of the Second World War. Finally, Former US Ambassador to Israel, Martin Indyk, weighs up the past and future of President Obama’s foreign policy in Obama's Big Ideas.
ArtPlay Events
In addition to our popular Schools' Program, Melbourne Writers Festival has included a range of children's and family events in this year's main program. Held at Birrarung Marr, our ArtPlay events are designed to spark the curiosity of every child, but you’ll need to hurry! Tickets are selling fast. These interactive, fun-filled events are designed to let children be creative and express themselves in an open and supportive environment. During the Festival, ArtPlay will become home talented writers and illustrators including Elizabeth Honey, Tohby Riddle, Jackie French, Asphyxia and Michael Pryor. To find out more about our ArtPlay and other children and family events, click here.
Walks
Discover Melbourne for the first time, or uncover a side of the city you’ve never seen before during one of our many walks. Join writer, historian and academic Dr Tony Moore as he takes you on a tour of Melbourne’s Bohemia. Have your eyes opened to the preponderance of dragons in Melbourne's public spaces in Carole Wilkinson’s walk Melbourne’s Hidden Dragons. Be inspired by Badaude, an illustrator famous for her depictions of London and Paris street fashion, as she hosts a walk celebrating Melbourne’s street fashion. All walks include afternoon tea and have a strictly limited capacity of 15. To find out more about our walks and book your spot, click here.
Taste of the Land
Adventurous diners will love Sarti's Indigenous-Calabrian themed dinner, created with native ingredients sourced using the hunting and foraging principles outlined in Riccardo Momesso's new book Antonio and Lucia. Momesso will speak to Aunty Carolyn Briggs, Indigenous elder and expert in native foraging to find the unlikely commonalities in their traditions – then forge an exciting new fusion between the two. Chaired by Michael Harden, this inventive food experience includes four courses with matched wines. To book your place at the table, click here.
Marcia Langton
The Foundation Chair of Australian Indigenous Studies at the University of Melbourne since February 2000, Marcia Langton is an anthropologist and geographer who has made a significant contribution to Indigenous studies at three universities. Marcia has also been instrumental in developing government and non-government policy and administration on Indigenous matters throughout her career. Her research concerns Indigenous relationships with place, land tenure and environmental management, agreement-making and treaties in the Northern Territory and Cape York Peninsula. Marcia will be appearing as part of the Big Ideas program, where she will present a solution for recognising Indigenous Australians in the constitution. To book, click here.
Friday Night Live
Join Australia's sharpest siren, Libbi Gorr, at the festival's Lettermanesque late-night talk-show. Libbi's guests include feminist and provocateur Germaine Greer, comedian and author Mark Watson and science-writer Margaret Wertheim; there's also a special appearance of the remarkable gothic electro musician Maria Minerva and comedian Lawrence Leung. With house band, TEK TEK ensemble, Libbi cracking her whipsmarts and the savviest and most thought-provoking guests, how could you miss it? To book your tickets, click here.
