Join Scribe authors Deborah Lipstadt, Emiliano Monge, Samer Nashef, Habiburahman, Andrea Goldsmith, Niki Savva, and Enza Gandolfo at the 2019 Melbourne Writers Festival.
Deborah Lipstadt is Dorot Professor of Modern Jewish History and Holocaust Studies at Emory University. Her books include The Eichmann Trial, Denial: holocaust history on trial (a National Jewish Book Award-winner), Denying the Holocaust: the growing assault on truth and memory, and Beyond Belief: the American press and the coming of the Holocaust, 1933–1945. Her latest book is Antisemitsm: here and now. She lives in Atlanta.
Monday 2 September — The Fifth Estate: Antisemitism
Tuesday 3 September — John Button Oration: In the Face of Hatred
Emiliano Monge is a multi-award-winning Mexican novelist, short-story writer, essayist, and reporter. In 2011, the Guadalajara International Book Fair FIL chose him as one of the top 25 best-kept secrets in contemporary Latin American literature, and more recently he was selected for México20, a list of twenty important young Mexican authors chosen by The British Council, FIL, Hay Festival, and Conaculta. His latest novel is Among the Lost.
Saturday 31 August — Bodies for Sale
Saturday 31 August — Emiliano Monge: Among the Lost
Samer Nashef qualified as a doctor at the University of Bristol in 1980 and is a consultant cardiac surgeon at Papworth Hospital in Cambridge. He is a dedicated teacher and communicator and is recognised as a world-leading expert on risk and quality in surgical care. He is the author of The Naked Surgeon and a compiler of cryptic crosswords for The Guardian and the Financial Times. His latest book is The Angina Monologues: stories of surgery for broken hearts.
Friday 6 September — Storytelling is the Best Medicine
Saturday 7 September — Muse in the Museum: Samer Nashef
Saturday 7 September — Samer Nashef: The Angina Monologues
Habiburahman, known as Habib, is a Rohingya. Born in 1979 in Burma (now Myanmar), he escaped torture, persecution, and detention in his country, fleeing first to neighbouring countries in Southeast Asia, where he faced further discrimination and violence, and then, in December 2009, to Australia, by boat. Habib spent 32 months in detention centres before being released. He now lives in Melbourne. Today, he remains stateless, unable to benefit from his full human rights. Habib founded the Australian Burmese Rohingya Organization (ABRO) to advocate for his people back in Myanmar and for his community. He is also a translator and social worker, the casual support service co-ordinator at Refugees, Survivors and Ex-Detainees (RISE), and the secretary of the international Rohingya organisation Arakan Rohingya National Organisation (ARNO), based in the UK. In 2019, he was made a Refugee Ambassador in Australia. The hardship and the human rights violation Habib has faced have made him both a spokesperson for his people and a target for detractors of the Rohingya cause. His book First, They Erased Our Name is out now.
Saturday 31 August — When We Talk About Home
Andrea Goldsmith originally trained as a speech pathologist and was a pioneer in the development of communication aids for people unable to speak. Her first novel, Gracious Living, was published in 1989. This was followed by Modern Interiors, Facing the Music, Under the Knife, and The Prosperous Thief, which was shortlisted for the 2003 Miles Franklin Literary Award. Reunion was published in 2009, and The Memory Trap was awarded the 2015 Melbourne Prize. Her literary essays have appeared in Meanjin, Australian Book Review, Best Australian Essays, and numerous anthologies. Her latest novel is Invented Lives.
Friday 6 September — Leave the Lights on Please
Saturday 7 September — Andrea Goldsmith: Invented Lives
Sunday 8 September — ’Til Death Do Us Part
Niki Savva is one of the most senior correspondents in the Canberra Press Gallery. She was twice political correspondent on The Australian, and headed up the Canberra bureaus of both The Herald Sun and The Age. When family tragedy forced a career change, she became Peter Costello’s press secretary for six years and was then on John Howard’s staff for three. Her work has brought her into intimate contact with Australia's major political players for more than 35 years. She is a regular columnist for The Australian, and often appears on ABC TV’s Insiders. In March 2017, the Melbourne Press Club bestowed Niki with a lifetime achievement award for ‘outstanding coverage of Australian politics as a reporter, columnist and author’. Her previous book, The Road to Ruin, was a major bestseller, and won the 2016 General Nonfiction Book of the Year Award at the Australian Book Industry Awards. Her latest book is Plots and Prayers.
Saturday 31 August — The Power and the Passion
Enza Gandolfo is a Melbourne writer and an honorary professor in creative writing at Victoria University. She is interested in the power of stories to create understanding and empathy, with a particular focus on feminist and political fiction. The co-editor of the journal TEXT and a founding member of the Victoria University Feminist Research Network, her first novel, Swimming (2009), was shortlisted for the Barbara Jefferis Award. Her latest novel, The Bridge, was shortlisted for the 2019 Stella Prize.
Sunday 1 September — Powerful Landmarks