Literary Death Match | Brisbane Writers Festival
You may have seen a sports match, maybe even a dance competition but nothing is quite a fierce as a Literary Death Battle.
The arena was the Princess Theatre, as fierce as the MCG on Boxing Day. The crowd was appropriately tipsy and rowdy for a Wednesday night on the town. The lighting was shmick and the judges were ready to roll. We had the jack of all trades/‘thrower of shit on a wall and seeing what sticks’ Benjamin Law, the pocket-rocket, beatboxing Hope One and the conqueror of the Argentinian men’s water polo team (you had to be there) Reuben Kaye.
Host Adrian Todd Zuniga deemed this event the night of our life in his opening monologue in which he tried to argue how Brisbane is a literary city as we coincidentally have street names that kind of align with famous literary figures. I’m sure that’s exactly what the city planners were thinking when they named Jane Street and Ernest Street…
The host brought on four incredible writers who took the stand and read five minutes of their work. There were four contestants, two heats and only one crown. To quote the host, tonight was going to be a ‘low brow low brow literary game cluster fuck.’
Our first two contestants were Lee McGowan and Martine Kropkowski. As they took to the stage, we couldn’t help but shiver in anticipation and excitement as to how this competitive Literary Hunger Games would commence.
McGowan went for 4 mins, 56 seconds with an ode to his very sharp-mouthed, very Scottish mother, with whom his relationship can only be described as begrudging. McGowan’s impassioned performance was boisterous in delivery yet sincere in content and had us all laughing along with him as he dodged metaphorical jaded bullets from his mother.
Kropkowski went for 4 mins 40 seconds, and was by contrast, a highly literary dissection of a complex relationship told through the lens of metaphors and imagery and other capital “L” literature creative writing techniques. Marten’s performance was subtle in its delivery, but the emotion of her text still filtered through in every line and ultimately led to her taking out Round 1.
After a brief intermission, or as you sports folk would say ‘half-time’, we’re back for round two. Round two contestants are Tobias Madden and Jonathan O’Brien. Coming at 5 mins and 4 seconds, Madden’s work was both charming and heartwarming and was a story about a ‘hard’ encounter with a beautiful man at the occupational therapist. The palpable sexuality was dripping off almost every word, especially those describing his favourite physio hunk. The story brave, vulnerable and earnest and really pulled on our heart strings and our belts.
Then came O’Brien with his nephew’s google search history of heterosexual desires, teenage anxieties and kayaks. An epistolary story that put a novel spin on a stream of consciousness narrative. Running for 5 mins 30 seconds, this story of web browsers took us all on an emotional journey that we did not expect. It was funny, innovative and real. Far too real…
It was competitive as a bloody and brutal game of dodge ball. And the final battle was between. Kropkowski and O’Brien in a game of Arithmalit, where the first team to ding the bell wins. The teams consisted of all contestants and the judges. The MC said two book titles with numbers, first person to add, subtract, divide or multiply them wins. Making authors do maths is definitely not the right thing to do. But needless to say, there was a winner and that winner was Team Johnathan O’Brien.
Check out the Brisbane Writers Festival program now.
This review was co-written with writer Harry Fritsch.
