So, what did YOU do on your weekend?
You may recall we weren’t completely overwhelmed by last year’s Melbourne Writers Festival…but the loyal Festival-goers that we are (I think this was my 10th year of attending)…we gave it another chance.
Our criticisms of last year are still valid – the venue (Federation Square) lacks the ‘destination‘ feel of a standalone venue like the Malthouse, or in Sydney, the Walsh Bay precinct. It’s just too easy to duck off to go shopping, or to the gallery, or to find chocolate…and we did.
There’s no crush in the foyer like there was at the Malthouse. You’re never sure if the person sitting next to you at the cafe is a fellow Festival-goer or a tourist just wandering through Fed Square.
And where were the long queues for author book-signings? M’s trusty author signing queuing methods (patent pending) were made redundant by the complete lack of queues. For one book I bought, there was even a complete lack of author to actually do the signing (despite what the sign said) until M harassed a festival volunteer and insisted they go fetch the author to sign my book.
Anyway, we’re feeling even more underwhelmed this year…and have started eyeing-off ads for Writers Festivals in Byron Bay or Ubud for next year. We mused on how we could go to the Hay Festival in England and make it tax deductible (“Hmmm…I think we’d actually have to be earning an income through books or writing for that to happen…”).
Some of the sessions were great nonetheless.
So what else did we get up to?
We also ducked into NGV International to see Persuasion: Fashion in the Age of Jane Austen.
Oh my. The stitching. The trim. The detail. And how tiny were those women?
There was one particularly interesting swan-down tippet. I now feel truly motivated to bring the tippet back into fashion. You can hold the swan-down though. I don’t want to be responsible for the extinction of a species.
