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| The Happy Mondays: Josepha Dietrich, Catherine Johnstone, Jodi Vial and Betty O'Neill |
"... During our residency at Gunyah, we plan to continue our process of working together, which began with the Varuna course. Being part of a writing collective has been transformative for each of us. This Gunyah residency is a rare chance to write together in the same place. Alongside our individual projects that we will each be working on, we will develop our collaborative 'project' of building a writers' collective, expanding on the many benefits of support, feedback, workshopping and company in the writing process. We’re looking forward to spending part of each day of the residency coming together to explore this. ..."
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Jodi Vial, with her microfiction The Span (published in the Landmarks anthology) at Newcastle Writers Festival 2016 |
Jodi Vial lives and writes on unceded Awabakal Land, Newcastle NSW. She recently graduated with a PhD in Creative Writing at the University of Newcastle, with a focus on the intersection of literature, landscape and history. Her work has appeared in poetry anthologies by Spineless Wonders, Papatanuaku Press and Recent Work Press, and her short story cycle Lives of Girls and Women was acquired for UON’s permanent art collection in 2018. Her prose poetry has been shortlisted three times in the Joanne Burns Prize as part of Newcastle Writers Festival, most recently in the 2025 prize.
"... During my residency at Gunyah, I’ll be working on the creative manuscript that formed part of my PhD thesis, 'All the Water a Body Can Hold', to reframe it for potential commercial publication. I will also be working on a book of prose poetry, refining my technique and approach to the form. ..."
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Josepha Dietrich, In Danger: A Memoir of Family and Hope, UQP, book cover |
Josepha Dietrich lives on Turrbal Land, Brisbane QLD. Her recent book, In Danger, was published by the University of Queensland Press (UQP). She works in Intelligence and Engagement at UQ, and is also a freelance editor. She previously worked as a university research assistant on improving psychiatric discharge planning and women’s wellness after cancer. Her prior long-term work was in assessing children’s and adolescents’ risk of harm alongside the Sexual Offences Child Abuse Unit of Victoria Police. To remain sane during this period, she flitted off overseas for months at a time to climb cliff faces while sleeping on beaches or in abandoned shepherds’ huts.
"... During my residency at Gunyah, I hope to leverage the support and knowledge I’ve gained in 2024 as part of a professionally guided writing group to further develop my speculative memoir manuscript. The writing group provides critical feedback on one another’s memoir development as well as the incidental support of working alongside one another. ..."
Catherine Johnstone is a queer writer from Wurundjeri Country, Melbourne VIC. She has a long association with the writing industry, having taught screenwriting and professional writing and editing. She has written and directed award-winning short films and received the Fiona Myer International Travel Award to work on her art in Venice, Italy. She has returned to writing fiction and creative non-fiction and in the last two years has been awarded writing fellowships at Varuna and KSP in Perth. She has been published in literary journals Meniscus and Westerly, and is shortlisted in the 2024 City of Melbourne Narrative Non-Fiction Prize.
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Stories of Place, book cover, 2025, Anthology of short fiction, with stories by Catherine Johnstone |
Catherine Johnstone is a queer writer from Wurundjeri Country, Melbourne VIC. She has a long association with the writing industry, having taught screenwriting and professional writing and editing. She has written and directed award-winning short films and received the Fiona Myer International Travel Award to work on her art in Venice, Italy. She has returned to writing fiction and creative non-fiction and in the last two years has been awarded writing fellowships at Varuna and KSP in Perth. She has been published in literary journals Meniscus and Westerly, and is shortlisted in the 2024 City of Melbourne Narrative Non-Fiction Prize.
"... During my residency at Gunyah, I plan to write the final essay for my memoir collection about the environment, climate change and loss, while I am in this beautiful location on Worimi Country. This essay will complete the collection, so I will also do second drafts of those essays not already published in literary journals. ..."
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Betty O'Neill, The Other Side of Absence, 2020, book cover |
Betty O'Neill is a writer and teacher, living on Gadigal Land, Sydney NSW. She has a Doctorate in Creative Arts from UTS, where she lectures in Creative Intelligence and Innovation. She wrote her doctoral thesis on her quest to understand her father, a World War II Polish resistance fighter who survived Auschwitz and Gusen. Betty has published academically and facilitated workshops in Australia and overseas on creativity, writing family history, the Cold War, migration and the domestic space as an archive. The Other Side of Absence: Discovering my father's secrets, 2020, was her debut memoir.
"... During my residency at Gunyah, I plan to review the first draft and complete a structural edit, of my current memoir project, which explores intergenerational homelessness with my own lived experience and tracing back five generations in my family. ..."
You can follow The Happy Monday's residency at Gunyah on Instagram @gunyahartists
