Mark's Say, September 2018
The cover of this month’s Readings Monthly features a picture of my son Joe and me in our newly refurbished Carlton shop, which Joe manages. It made me think of my own father, who’d died when I was 20 and had never been able to see a glimpse of what I would become; all he’d seen was a rather confused uni student who’d just failed his first year of medicine and was embarking on an arts degree (which was never finished, by the way). My son Joe has the degree, and a post-graduate diploma in creative writing, and is now becoming an integral part of Readings; I’m very proud of him.
Thinking of my father made me wonder what he’d have felt if he’d been at the Art Gallery of New South Wales (where a painting by his father, Antonio Dattilo- Rubbo, hangs proudly) in August when I, at the tender age of 69, received the Emerging Philanthropy Leadership Award from Creative Partnerships Australia. The Award recognised my, and The Readings Foundation’s, support for the Hot Desk Fellowships at the Wheeler Centre.
The support and promotion of Australian writing and publishing has been a passion of mine and of Readings since the early eighties. The Wheeler Centre Hot Desk Fellowships came about when Michael Williams, the amazing director of the Wheeler Centre, and I sat down together to think of ways we could help emerging writers. We came up with a plan to provide emerging writers with a $1000 stipend and workspace in the Wheeler Centre over a ten-week period.
That was seven years ago and 142 writers have passed through since the first intake in 2012. I now have the great pleasure of having books on Readings’ shelves that have been produced by Wheeler Centre Hot Desk Fellows. I’m particularly excited by the fact that two Wheeler Centre Fellows appear on the 2018 shortlist for the Readings Prize for New Australian Fiction: Jamie Marina Lau for her first book, Pink Mountain on Locust Island, and Jennifer Down for her second book, Pulse Points.
Michael and his team and I catch up regularly to discuss the fellowships and how we could improve and expand them. Michael wondered if we could provide a residency for regional writers. So, the Wheeler Centre applied for a grant from the Copyright Agency to fund a residency program for regional writers. Where could they stay? My dad, who was a professor at Melbourne University, had a little bolthole off Cardigan Street in Carlton. When he died, he left it to his partner, the acclaimed sculptor Norma Redpath. Next door to it was a slightly rundown, but charming bluestone cottage owned by the university. Norma proposed a deal to the university: to let her turn the cottage into a residence and studio, and then when she died she would leave dad’s bolthole to the university. Norma died a few years ago and the university has since established the Redpath Studio for visiting artists. Dad’s bolthole is a self-contained space and with a bit of renovation would be a perfect place to house our regional writers. The residency is aimed at providing opportunities to emerging writers from all over the country who could not ordinarily participate in such a scheme due to the challenge of living too far away.
So, next year, if you are a writer who lives in Ararat or Sydney or Hobart, watch this space! Maybe you’ll complete your masterpiece in Dad’s bolthole.
