Extraordinary Political Cartoonist to Deliver 2015 PEN Lecture in Hobart
Amber Wilson, Tasmanian Writers’ Centre Communications Officer
The Tasmanian Writers’ Centre is hosting what is sure to be an astounding evening with political commentary comic designer Pat Armstrong and award-winning graphic novelist Nicki Greenberg on June 6, 6pm-8pm.
The event, to be held at the Ten Days office in Murray Street, is in partnership with Her Majesty’s Favourite Really Great Graphical Festival. The avant-garde festival is now in its second year and is running across various venues including the former Mercury building foyer, Frankie’s Empire and the Homestead.
The lecture will form part of the annual PEN (“Poets, Essayists and Novelists”) brief in Australia – to help fight censorship. PEN is an international organisation that aims to celebrate literature and uphold freedom of expression. PEN International has just finished a week of back-to-back lectures in New York City, featuring Tasmanian Man Booker Prize winner Richard Flanagan. Richard spoke in conversation last Friday with American novelist Claire Messud about his novel, The Narrow Road to the Deep North and his father’s experiences in a Japanese POW camp.
Sydney’s Pat Armstrong is sure to draw strong crowds in his Hobart appearance – his story is fascinating. In early 2014, millionaire Graeme Wood pulled the funding to his experiment in Australian web-journalism, the Global Mail. The final piece that was published on the website was the extraordinary comic: At Work Inside Our Detention Centres: A Guard’s Story, a piece developed from a series of interviews with workers from Australian detention centres. Pat was the designer for the team, and one of the instigators of the story, which gained a Walkley nomination.
As part of the Hobart PEN lecture, Pat will be giving an insight into the process of producing an incredibly moving story in an unusual medium, as well as some of the difficulties experienced in journalism in dealing with stories about detention.
Pat will be joined on the night by award-winning Nicki Greenberg from Melbourne, who has written and illustrated a raft of children’s books as well as two well-loved graphic novels published by Allen & Unwin – The Great Gatsby, and Hamlet, which is described as an “imaginative and lavish” 425-page adaptation of Shakespeare’s play. Nicki will talk about the arduous process of adapting Hamlet to the page.
Ticket costs are $15/$10 and include a $5 donation to PEN. Tickets are available via Eventbrite here: http://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/pen-lecture-an-evening-with-graphic-artists-nicki-greenberg-and-pat-armstrong-tickets-16931281920
www.tasmanianwriters.org