Kill Your Darlings Journal » Podcast

Welcome to the final episode of the KYD Podcast for 2014: The Gift Edition! Featuring Alice Pung, Erik Jensen, Helen Razer and Zora Sanders.

Welcome to the second Kill Your Darlings Podcast! Featuring interviews with Liam Pieper, Emily Bitto, Kate Larsen, Justin Heazlewood and Elwyn Murray.

With Christmas just around the corner, Meaghan Dew chats to five Melbourne booksellers about the best books to give as gifts, and highlights some of the most popular titles of 2013. Featuring: Henk Kelly-Kobes, Dymocks Camberwell Cathy Todd, Berkelouw Books Armadale Peter Maws, The Brunswick Street Bookstore Pia Spreadborough, Readings Malvern Daniella Robertson, Readings Malvern Music by Audionautix.

What expat job could be better than working at a bookstore in Paris? Word-loving Francophile Meaghan Dew speaks to booksellers from two well-known English-language bookstores, in the hopes of discovering whether the reality is as idyllique as it sounds.

Does taking poetry slams into schools ignite students’ appreciation for traditional poetry and literature in general? Irma Gold chats to experienced poetry slammer Will Small and 17-year-old student Sam Francis about dynamic ways of teaching the canon, including the links between hip hop and performance poetry. Podcast production by Gold Music Productions. Irma Gold is an award-winning writer and editor. Her third children’s book, Megumi and the Bear, has just been released through Walker Books, and she is currently completing her debut novel. She is the commissioning editor of a number of anthologies, including The Invisible Thread, a century of literature by Canberra writers. Visit her at irmagold.com or follow her on Facebook and Twitter. 

  Launching a publishing venture is a leap of faith--whether it’s a brand new print publication or an interpretation of an already successful one. In this podcast, Meaghan Dew asks Dumbo Feather’s Digital Director Brendan McKnight, and Damed editor Mad Dame, how it feels to take that jump.  

Grown-ups can learn a lot from children. When it comes to the big questions in life, children have a natural ability to wonder. In this second episode, Erin and Fleur find out what our Little Pearlers think about their careers and what they want to be when they grow up. Music compliments of Kevin MacLeod.

From Dylan Thomas, the Beats and Hunter S Thompson, to fictional Bernard Black, the image of the writer has long been romanticised as an unhealthy, alcoholic and otherwise-addled self-destructive force. But is this an outdated portrayal, and could it be holding us back creatively? Is it time for writers to ditch the boozey hedonist image and embrace running gear? I had a chat with three writers about their own exercise habits and how it affects their writing practice: philosopher and author of How to Exercise Damon Young, director of the Melbourne Writers Festival and bike nerd Lisa Dempster, and feminist commentator and roller derby’s ‘The Cleminist’ Clementine Ford.

Some stories seem universal but others are forever linked to a particular place, whether because of where we first read or heard them, or because the story itself brings a particular location to life. In this podcast, links between story and place are explored. Estelle Tang recommends books for those about to travel, Matt Blackwood speaks about his Locative Literature projects, and Lesley Alway explains the Bookwallah program, which takes Australian authors and stories to another location altogether. Meaghan Dew is an orders coordinator at Penguin Books and a bookseller at Dymocks Camberwell. She has previously hosted The Sunday Blurb on SYN.

What do literary agents even do, and how do you get one? Should you get one? Irma Gold talks to Australian authors, Jackie French and Marion Halligan, and agency founder Mary Cunnane about the industry dos and don’ts. French decided against having an agent after having one for only two months. One agent, meanwhile, has represented Halligan over her entire career, and Cunanne breaks down the importance of understanding the business of contracts. Podcast production by Gold Music Productions. Irma Gold is an award-winning writer and editor. Her third children’s book, Megumi and the Bear, has just been released through Walker Books, and she is currently completing her debut novel. She is the commissioning editor of a number of anthologies, including The Invisible Thread, a century of literature by Canberra writers. Visit her at irmagold.com or find her on Facebook.

Whether the peak of a writer’s career or an arbitrary measure of accomplishment, literary prizes are an exciting yet somewhat mysterious element of the publishing industry. What happens in the lead up the big announcement? Does the winner know they’ve won beforehand? How much should you Google your competitors? Jessica Alice talks to Maxine Beneba Clarke (winner of the Victorian Premier’s Award for an Unpublished Manuscript for Foreign Soil) and Romy Ash (shortlisted for the Miles Franklin for Floundering) about their survival advice for being nominated—and possibly winning—a literary prize.

Australia is now well and truly into performance poetry: we have the National Poetry Slam drawing huge crowds every year, and smaller events popping up regularly in our capital cities. But what makes a writer become a performer, and how does performance change the written word? Sky Kirkham examines the nature and history of slam, from Def Jam Poetry and the Nuyorican in the United States, to the Sydney Opera House. Sky talks with Ken Arkind, Josh Donellan, Anis Mojgani, Jive Poetic, Bo Svoronos, and Kate Tempest about their experience as performance poets, and the continuing role of slam in Australian society.