The days of the Mountains operating as mirror to the Sydney Writers Festival may be over, with Varuna, the National Writers House in line to launch an independent writers festival here.
Varuna has just received $27,500 in funding from the federal government to establish its own festival.
Executive director, Veechi Stuart, said the prospect was thrilling.
“I’m absolutely sure it will work because we have been doing the satellite festival for years. It’s not like we’re starting from scratch.”
She said Varuna had the connections and the knowledge to run a festival. And she believed the community – which already supported the satellite events – would be “right behind us”.
The government grant will support the transition – “and help us get a really strong program for that first year to really put us on the map.”
She believed the Mountains festival would probably be held in the autumn or winter of 2019.
“We will have a couple of big international names and we hope to have at least one big international figure.”
Ms Veechi believed it would become a landmark on Australia’s cultural calendar.
“This annual festival will raise the profile of our region’s most talented writers and celebrate the best of Australian literature.”
Liberal Senator for Western Sydney, Marise Payne, said a four-day festival would encourage visitors to stay locally, which would be a boost to local businesses.
Macquarie MP, Susan Templeman, congratulated the team at Varuna.
“Varuna has been able to attract high quality writers to its past events and demonstrated that there is a real appetite for this from both locals and visitors,” she said.
