The Division of Humanities and the Centre for Irish and Scottish
Studies at the University of Otago are delighted to announce that the inaugural
University of Otago Scottish Writers Fellow will be the acclaimed Scottish
novelist Janice Galloway.
Janice Galloway, who will take up the three-month Fellowship in
April, is one of the most accomplished and acclaimed writers in the United
Kingdom. Her debut novel, The Trick is to
Keep Breathing (1989) won the 1990 MIND/Allen Lane Book of the Year Award.
Her book of short stories, Blood
(1991) was a New York Times Notable
Book of the Year. In 1994 she won the E. M. Forster Award from the American
Academy of Arts and Letters and the McVitie’s Prize for Scottish Writer of the
Year for her novel Foreign Parts. Her novel Clara (2002) won the Saltire Society Scottish Book of the Year
Award. Her memoir, All Made Up, won
the non-fiction category in the 2012 Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust Book of
the Year Awards.
Janice Galloway has been a writer in residence for four Scottish
prisons, Times Literary Supplement
Research Fellow to the British Library, a resident writer at Jura Distillery,
and at the Hotel Chevillon in France courtesy of the Robert Louis Stevenson
Award. She has taught creative writing at the University of Glasgow and the
University of Stirling.
The University of Otago Scottish Writers Fellowship is a three-month
literary residency based at the Pah Homestead in Auckland. The Fellowship aims
to encourage literary and cultural exchange between Scotland and New Zealand.
It is open to writers of Scottish residency, background or affiliation.
Janice Galloway will take up the three-month Fellowship in April of
2014.
Professor Brian Moloughney, Pro-Vice-Chancellor of Humanities at the
University of Otago, warmly welcomes Janice Galloway’s appointment.
“I am delighted that a writer of Janice Galloway’s stature and
accomplishment has been chosen as our inaugural Scottish Writers Fellow. Janice
Galloway is a writer of international significance. Her presence in New Zealand
will help to develop cultural and academic connections between Scotland and New
Zealand and will enhance the work of our Centre for Irish and Scottish Studies
here at the University of Otago.”
Professor Liam McIlvanney, Stuart Chair in Scottish Studies at the
University of Otago, says Janice Galloway is one of the “undisputed stars of
contemporary Scottish literature.”
“She is a bona fide world-class talent. Alongside writers like James
Kelman and Alasdair Gray, she helped to kick-start the extraordinary literary
renaissance that Scotland has enjoyed over the past three decades. For the
Scottish Studies programme at Otago it will be a tremendous privilege to host Janice
Galloway,” he says.
Damien Wilkins, Director of the International Institute of Modern
Letters at Victoria University of Wellington, gave his own response to the
announcement:
“Janice Galloway is a wonderful choice to kick off this exciting
Fellowship. A major fiction writer and memoirist, Janice is an exuberant
writer, though it’s Scottish exuberance so that means—winningly—she’s also
usually having a dig at her own enthusiasms. She’s a wonderful communicator,
too, about writing and about the world.”
During the tenure of her Fellowship, Janice Galloway will undertake
public readings and masterclasses throughout New Zealand. Confirmed events
include: an interview and masterclass at the International Institute of Modern
Letters at Victoria University of Wellington; a reading at the Dunedin Writers
& Readers Festival in May; an appearance at the NZ Society of Authors AGM
at Whangerei; and a reading at the Auckland Writers and Readers Festival.
Contact
Professor Liam McIlvanney
Stuart Chair in Scottish Studies
University of Otago
Tel: 03 479 4936
Email: liam.mcilvanney@otago.ac.nz
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