The 2003 Byron Bay Writers Festival was another fabulous success with a record crowd of 20,000 plus, converging on the wildly beautiful North Coast town.
Bar the arctic freeze which gripped opening night festivities, visitors lapped up a mid-winter dose of Byron’s blazing blue skies and warm sun. A few people went for a swim. Whales were spotted. Gossip and passion – as in lively discussion and debate – flowed as freely as the white wine. And former PM Malcolm Fraser and his wife Tammy, who were guests of the festival, stayed on afterwards to enjoy the local golf courses.
The Australian Women’s Weekly was a major sponsor of the Byron Bay Writers Festival for the third year in a row and launched The Australian Women’s Weekly/Dilmah Short Story Contest at the opening night dinner (for more information see a special section in another part of The AWW Book Club).
There were bucket-loads of famous writers: playwright David Williamson and his wife Kristin, Peter Singer, Norma Khouri, Peter FitzSimons, Susan Mitchell, Garry Disher, Hanifa Deen, Sarah MacDonald, David Leser, Martin Flanagan, Thea Astley, Tim Flannery, Paul Jennings, Christopher Kremmer, Mungo MacCallum and Di Morrissey, among them.
For those who couldn’t make it to Byron Bay, here are a few snippets:
The audience was stunned to hear Norma Khouri (Forbidden Love) reveal that a fatwa has been taken out on her by the Jordanian government.
Di Morrissey, in a session about Broome as an inspiration for writers, told how one of her first connections with the WA coastal town was when she came across a strand of lustrous Broome pearls in a shop. Di asked the assistant how many books she’d have to sell to buy them, who replied: “Four hundred … thousand.”
Seen at Di Morrissey’s Friday night cocktail party, Tammy Fraser whistling softly for Malcolm to follow her through a crowd.
Who was the Melbourne writer who went for a skinny dip, only to come out of the water to find his clothes ‘stolen’ by a practical joker?
In the session titled Biography: Other People’s Lives, Peter FitzSimons and Susan Mitchell swapped notes about the perils of writing about “very high profile people” with “high self-esteem.” Peter admitted that such was her displeasure with the finished book, one of his subjects hadn’t turned up at the book launch. Susan topped that by admitting she hadn’t even been invited to the launch of a book she had written about a famous person.
David Williamson on working with Madonna on his play Up For Grabs, in London: “She’s interesting, intelligent and very forceful. She likes to get her own way. Madonna hasn’t got to where she is by being a wilting flower. We had some tussles … and I lost them.”
David Williamson to his wife Kristin, as he was getting dressed to take part in a session titled Approaching The Big Issues with an Inquiring Mind? “What does someone with big ideas wear?”
Susan Mitchell revealed that she is writing a book about the Snowtown murders, in a similar style to Midnight In The Garden of Good and Evil.
Malcolm Fraser, quoting his famous quote in full: “Life wasn’t meant to be easy, but take courage child, it can be delightful.” Mathuselah.
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