Mark's Say, March 2020
One of the booksellers at Readings Kids suggested in early January that we do something to support the bushfire victims. We decided to put the money we raised from gift wrapping in January towards bushfire relief. We also decided that Readings would match the amount collected. In a normal January we collect about $1000. We were thrilled that in response to our call the amount raised this January was $8,605. With Readings’ contribution the total to be donated is $17,210, so we’ve just made two equal donations – one to the Victorian Bushfire Appeal and one to Zoos Victoria’s Bushfire Emergency Wildlife Fund. Our heartfelt thanks go out to everyone who supported this initiative.
At the start of each new year we tally up our bestsellers for the previous year. Seeing it so starkly brings a few surprises. In our top 100 books, 49 were by Australian authors or originated in Australia, 49 were by women, 12 were by Indigenous Australians, 2 were by Readings staff, 45 were non-fiction, 13 were children’s books, 39 fiction, and 3 were cookbooks. What was most surprising was that our bestselling book was Bruce Pascoe’s Dark Emu, which was originally published in 2014. It also sold 61% more copies than our number 2 bestseller, Trent Dalton’s novel Boy Swallows Universe.
We’ve all noticed the shrinking review pages in our newspapers as advertising declines. The Copyright Agency, in partnership with the Judith Neilson Institute for Journalism and Ideas, is trying to address this trend with a grant of $150,000 to support the publication of more arts reviews and criticism in The Australian, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, The Brisbane Times and _WA Today. The $150,000 granted to the media companies will be in addition to the existing review spending by News Corp and Nine on arts and review coverage. It will be interesting see the impact.
The Wheeler Centre turns 10 this year. The centre was set up by the Bracks government as part of its commitment to Melbourne becoming a UNESCO City of Literature. It received enthusiastic bipartisan support and became an instant success both in the quality of its programming and its warm welcome by Melburnians. Since opening its doors in 2010, the Wheeler Centre has hosted more than 2,400 events and 4,200 speakers. More than 380,000 people have attended their events, predominantly in Melbourne, but also across Victoria. Seventy per cent of those events have been free. It’s also given many writers their big break through their writer support programs, the Hot Desk Fellowships and the Next Chapter scheme.
At its inception, the government asked media proprietor Eric Beecher to be the inaugural chair of the then unnamed centre. After appointing Chrissy Sharp (now CEO of the Sydney Writers’ Festival) as director, the next appointment was Michael Williams as head of programming. When Chrissy left in 2011, Michael was the natural successor. Michael has helped position the Wheeler Centre as one of the most respected literary institutions in the world. Just a few weeks ago, he announced that he felt it was time to hand over to someone else. Melbourne, and Australia, should be pretty grateful to the role Michael has played in shaping the Wheeler Centre.
