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The Shoalhaven Branch of the FAW has been in
existence since September 1979. Its first President was Joy Maclean, seen
here in 1984 presenting a certificate to a young writer at the City Library.
The Secretary was Don Bostock and with a few dedicated members things
began. Meetings were held once a month at the Nowra
Technical College. |
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 (photograph from The South Coast Register)
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Bill McKinnon
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As the club moved into the eighties numbers
increased and a book was produced with stories from members of the group.
The meetings consisted of guest writers and set assignments. There was an annual
short story competition with a prize donated by Angus and Robertson in Nowra.
Other competitions were entered into such as the Senior Citizens Committee.
New members continued to come along and meetings were now held in the evenings at
the Nowra Primary School. Articles appeared in the local press about the
club and the successes of its members this was no doubt helped along by the
excellent, fun
efforts of the Publicity Officer, Bill McKinnon. |
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As the nineties began the Short Story Competition
continued now with the assistance of Dymocks - Nowra. The picture here shows the winners from
1992. Meetings shifted to the North
Nowra Tavern and were held during the day on Fridays and another anthology was
published called "Telling Tales". Get togethers were also arranged between
different writing groups in the region including Eurobodalla. As the years
continued the meetings were increased from once a month to twice to include more
features for the members. As before there was plenty of publicity in the
local papers thanks to the new Publicity Officer, Irene WIlkie. Another
book was published called "Wild Birds Rising". |
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(photograph from The South Coast Register)
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The new millennium saw the 21st birthday for the FAW
Shoalhaven with meetings continuing on a Friday but now located at the library
meeting room. The President at that time was Norma Dawson and is seen here
cutting the cake. Competitions were still organised with the inauguration of
the Lyrebird Short Story Competition. A new
book was published by the group members called
"Midday the River" and in 2004 another entitled "Does a Lyrebird Fly". The
group also became involved with publishing books written by local young people.
The first one was called "Streets Echo" followed by "Freaky Fantasies and Fun" in
2003. |
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In 2005
the annual short story competition became a major
award with a money prize and a residency at Bundanon
for the winner. It was renamed the Shoalhaven
Literary Award presented in conjunction with the
Shoalhaven Arts Board. The inaugural prize was
won by Kathryn Lomer of Tasmania for her work "Kafka's House". With the expansion
of the club the venue was moved to the Arts Centre to accommodate the new
members. The club continues to progress with lively members who enjoy indulging in their mutual passion for writing.
In 2006 the Shoalhaven Literary Award for poetry was
awarded to Peter Bakowski for his wonderful poem
"Portrait of Leonard Drysdale, clerk, Birmingham,
England. Allan Mackay was
elected President and is now ready to take the group
on towards its thirtieth birthday.
2007 sees the publication of our
latest collection of poetry, short stories and
photographs entitled all this All this Life.
We also launched a new literary competition for a
one act play. |
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The Writers of the Shoalhaven
at the launch of
All This Life
(photograph courtesy of the South Coast Register) |
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We learn from history that we learn nothing from
history. George Bernard Shaw. |
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