Bryan Kelleher Literary Award

[Gary Harding]

If the prestigious Bryan Kelleher Literary Award is no more, well I am very sad for writers and for Australia.

I just loved those people at Australian Unity.

They were very kind and generous to me when I was down in Melbourne. I am a humble bloke and have nothing but praise and gratitude for what they did in the way they did it. Supporting traditional Bush Poetry. Absolutely fantastic. Kindness personified. Professionally organised.

Met Noel and of course the late Kym Eitel there.... lovely people... it was all great fun!

As for rules preventing past awardees from entering for a year?

I can understand perfectly where Australian Unity are coming from and support them fully. Guys... take a rest for a year and let someone else have a crack at it. Same people there every year could understandably demoralise and discourage other entrants and that is not the intention and spirit of the Award. In turn, less entries means it is easier for a small clique to dominate. Encouragement of all Australian traditional poetry writers is also what it is about, as well as recognizing excellence.

No big deal, and a huge complement if you are temporaily sidelined for being too good or monopolising it! It is a BIG complement.

So I do not think it is a "strange" decision at all. Nor, I expect, would it leave a bad taste in anybody's mouth and it is silly for anyone to suggest it. It was the absolutely correct approach. It is THEIR competition.
It was eminently sensible in the interest of the Competition of which they are charged with stewardship... even if not in the self-interest of any particular entrant. And the Award is more important than any individual I am afraid. In their shoes I would have done exactly the same thing.

I have not come across any public criticism of Australian Unity in the Henry Lawson Society Journal by any past Awardees as claimed (but then my fees are overdue so perhaps the mag missed me then?) I would be very upset if that indeed happened.

I sincerely appreciate all that Australian Unity have done to perpetuate Bryan Kelleher's name and in supporting traditional Australian writing. Magnificient.

Gratitude. Being humble. Appreciative.

I reckon I just scraped in with my win that year 2010. Probably other entrants were better...

It is Australian Unity's competition. I for one respect that.

They tell people THEIR rules, and if they do not like it.... well do not enter again. Simple.

Australian Unity are wonderful. I simply cannot speak highly enough of them or accord them any more respect than what I do.

As the 2010 Winner I can only say I admire them, and as for criticising them publicly or privately???? Unreal. You gotta be kidding.!!!

Never ever in ten million years would I ever have the gall and arrogance to speak one bad word against them, even if I had one, which I certainly don't!! I would be so ashamed. As for any awardee turning on them publicly in a journal, if that happened ??? or even here !? Never. It is just not done.

Now I know I am a person of little style and even less literary ability.... and yes I know that I can be bought for money if the price is right... but no amount of money would ever entice me to utter even a syllable against those fantastic people at Australian Unity.

I was puzzled as to why their prestigious Award is no more and... well I think I now have an understanding of why. And I do not blame them one bit.

If I was a Manager at Australian Unity and found my organisation, whose integrity is beyond question, being publicly criticized by anyone that my company had treated magnanimously.. people that have been handsomely rewarded financially, their work kindly reproduced in the Australian Unity magazine, and a large degree of public acclaim given.. let me say I would be telling those so-called "poets" what they could do with their writing and believe me it would not be pleasant. Cancellation of the Bryan Kelleher Literary Award would be immediate. None of those people would get the opportunity to receive another cent of Australian Unity's money again.. even if they were the next Henry Lawson.

[David Campbell]

Catherine actually wrote to the HLS magazine about the ban twice, Gary...once in the July/August 2013 issue, and again in the most recent issue. It would seem that your fees are very much overdue if you missed both of her letters. They were very reasonable and rational. For the record, I agree entirely with what she wrote, and also with what Stephen has said in the other thread.

David

[Heather]

I'm with you David. To be the best you have to beat the best otherwise there is no competition. We don't hold the best footballers back because they've won three games in a row. We don't tell our atheletes they can't go to the Olympics because they've been before and what do all young kids in sport aspire to be - as good as the best.

I remember coming second to Kym in a competition and on other occasions being amongst the credits with David Campbell and Ellis Campbell and others - and that was a thrill just to be named with them. I don't want to win a competition (not that I enter may these days), because there are a low number of entries or the best poets aren't allowed to enter - that is not a competition.

Gary you really do need an editor!

[Gary Harding]

Yes I do need an editor and I accept your kind offer Heather, thanks! .. especially in poetry writing where I get muddled up at times.

I could not think of a nicer one. I cannot pay you of course but you can have a free annual holiday in Hervey Bay instead. I am very disappointed that you are not posting many of your wonderful poems these days. I miss them.

As an entrant to the Bryan Kelleher Award, if one is politely and temporarily sidelined, sent to the bench in order to make way for other Australian poets to have their time in the limelight as well and thereby encourage their talent and participation.... and allow the competition to function in the spirit it was intended, then what is wrong with that? It is noble. Why not support it. If the organisers have acted pre-emptively in order to prevent their Competition from being monopolised by a few (albeit incredibly amazingly brilliant poets) then one accepts that with a good grace .. and shuts-up.

What sort of a competition would they have if it keeps being won by that same one or two? Instead of six hundred entries, you would have sixty, or six. It becomes a monument to the greatness of one or two and while that may suit the agenda of those select one or two, it makes a farce of the competition and destroys it for the vast majority.

I have no problem with poets being Great, but they also need to be Great People as well... empathise with those lesser mortals who would like to feel they have at least a sporting chance to get a place. The aim is also to foster talent, reward it, encourage it.

If winning or placing in the competiton every second year, instead of every year just isn't good enough.... and one feels the need to take pen to paper and slam the Organisers who have been so incredibly kind to you in the past.. well I think a lesson in plain good manners may be in order.

You move over for a bit and let others have a go too, in the interests of the Competition, and you do it smiling and with a good grace. You do not feel aggreived, hardly done by and claim that it is just not cricket.

Same applies to Awardees who indirectly criticise Australian Unity by publicly proclaiming their support for people who act that way. They are equally culpable.

Australian Unity are wonderful to their Awardees. The money they gave, certificates, lovely dinner, poetry workshop, staff time and huge admin cost overall, airfares, poem printed in the Australian Unity Magazine with massive circulation. Poem on their website. Incredible.

For a humble peddler of rhyme let me tell you it doesn't get any better !!

I hope they are still my good friends.

So for those who TAKE and then turn around and bite the hand that has so kindly fed them I have only contempt. If others support their behaviour and criticise Australian Unity, then we shall agree to have a different perspective on what is right and wrong in life. What constitutes good manners.

I am sad for Australian Poetry, and for the young kids and other aspiring poets who will now miss the opportunity to participate in this prestigious and fun Award and Competition. I have all the time in the world for kids and people who try to write and rhyme... who love bush poetry and who would have loved to enter this great competition.

For those cannot think beyond Themselves I have no time whatsoever.

[Heather]

Aaah Gary, you can't afford me but I will tell you (gratis) that you don't use capital leters just because you think something is important! .... and I'm not posting because I haven't written anything lately - it happens


Heather

[David Campbell]

You seem to be overlooking one or two things, Gary. You have mounted a vitriolic, unfair attack on a fine poet, suggesting quite clearly that she is responsible for the shutting down of the Bryan Kelleher Award. And, by your own admission, you have done so without reading what she wrote, and without having any idea of the facts behind the closure of the BKA. Perhaps you need reminding of something you wrote earlier in the year on this site, quoted as written:

“What I hate is being factually wrong. being caught out in a poorly researched claim. My spelling errors slip through and that is a minor embarrassment.... but facts I check ten times now. Plus I query and quote the sources too.. much safer.”

And now you see fit to comment on what constitutes “good manners”?

David

[manfredvijars]

In the last ten years or so, there have been many written competitions held without excluding previous winners.
Yet I cannot recall any particular writer "scooping the pool" consistantly over that period. Yes, familiar names crop up regularly in the top five, but not one that dominates.
Although I could be wrong ....

[Gary Harding]

.. anyway thanks guys.... nice to get supportive feedback! I appreciate it.

If we all saw things the same way, it would be a dull world, wouldn't it??

Talk about dumb... I thought I did not have "The Kerrigan Boys and Other Australian Verses" by Edward Harrington.

So I went out bought two copies... one the cheapy, and the other a rare printer's special hard-bound gilt-title for $60 total.

Went to put them in the library and.. there was already a copy there.. hiding!! So now I have three.

I mean how many times can one read the same work.??

However.. I also procured "My Old Black Billy" 5/- .. words by Edward Harrington, music by Roy Jeffries for $25. A music book. Pretty cool man, and groovy.

If anyone can decipher the sharps and flats of it all.. I reckon it would make a great music get-together for all of us ABPA members around a nice campfire some time!

All good fun. Cheers, Gary

[Brenda Joy]

On behalf of the ABPA I have been in contact with the organizers of the Bryan Kelleher.
I expressed how highly regarded the competition was to ABPA members and how disappointed we were that it was closing. They had not heard of the ABPA so I referred them to our website and explained what we were about.

They said that their reason for abandoning the competition was due to a declining number of entries.
They believed that this was due to the same poets winning consistently.

I pointed out that this was probably not the reason for the decline in entries and that the condition they had imposed about previous winning poets was looking at a ‘Poet’ and not the ‘Poems’ (i.e. that it was usual to disallow poems that had won a prize in a previous year but not other poems submitted by the winning Poets).

I also pointed out that by disallowing poems that had even been only ‘commended’ elsewhere would have restricted the number of poems available to be entered.

The outcome is that they are going to review the situation so I will keep you posted.

Hal

[Mal McLean]

Well done Hal