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Member only guide to the Australian book industry.
Each year, the Australian Society of Authors awards a two-week residential fellowship to a writer under the age of 35 who is as yet unpublished. The fellowship is comprised of a two-week residency (including accommodation and all food), a one-hour consultation with a Varuna consultant, a year’s membership to the Australian Society of Authors, and travel subsidy if the recipient lives outside of NSW.
The residency has been established by the Koppe family as a tribute to their mother, Ray Koppe. Ray, who for many years managed the business affairs of the ASA, was always passionately interested in and supportive of, young writers. (Read more about Ray here)
The recipient will be asked to acknowledge The Ray Koppe Young Writers’ Residency in any published work associated with time spent at Varuna.
Past winners include Aaliyah Sugitha (2022), Sarah Stivens (2021), Tim McGuire (2020), Hayley Scrivenor (2019), Holden Sheppard (2017), Nick Couldwell (2016), Chloe Higgins (2015), Danielle Binks (2014), Hannah Bent (2013), Dimitra Harvey (2012) and Renae Gibson (2011).
This flagship fellowship is part of the Varuna Residential Fellowships program: https://www.varuna.com.au/fellowships/raykoppe
Applications for the 2024 Residency Program open
15 June 2023
Applications close
Midnight, 31 July 2023
Varuna Residential Fellowships can be taken between January and August 2024
You will need to submit between 7,000 and 10,000 words from the beginning of your manuscript, along with a synopsis of the entire work. For poetry, you need to send a selection of 10 poems.
Application fees are $65 per application, unless you are a financially current Varuna alumni member using your annual fee waiver. Application fees are used to pay professional assessors to read your work. If you have a Healthcare card, the application fee is $35.
How to prepare your submissions: https://www.varuna.com.au/resfellowships-preparing-your-submission
FAQs: https://www.varuna.com.au/residential-fellowships-faq
The 2023 ASA/Varuna Ray Koppe Young writers Residency is awarded to Aaliyah Sugitha for their memoir Somatic.
Somatic is a memoir that explores the relationship between mother and daughter, mental health, and the body. In its current form, Somatic experiments with fragmentary poetic expression to depict trauma.
Aaliyah is a Sydney based teacher and emerging writer. She holds a Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in English Literature and History, and a Bachelor of Education. She has a fascination with the aesthetic workings of a text, and hopes to further explore this throughout her own work.
Congratulations Aaliyah!
Find out more about the 2023 Flagship Fellowships here.
