WritersBLOCK / ReadersBLOCK

WritersBLOCK / ReadersBLOCK consists of a writer-in-residence, and a reader-in-residence. Housed in glass boxes on pedestals, the public observes a local writer producing work in real time, and a reader engaged in reading (Tasmanian books) in the same moment.

The project highlights author and reader as creative artifacts, inviting the public to notice what these activities involve while highlighting the importance of observing and preserving these, increasingly uncommon, activities in Australian society. By viewing writing and reading as vulnerable and precious, the project encourages dialogue around their future.

Furthermore, WritersBLOCK / ReadersBLOCK, invites the viewer and participants to consider the blocks, or resistance, that readers and writers encounter when reading or writing books, whether that be societal blocks, practical ones, or personal blocks.

It's long been established that reading and writing have myriad benefits, including reducing stress and increasing wellbeing, building vocabulary, improving sleep, as well as helping build neurological pathways to increase empathy (Stansfield & Bunce, 2014). Additionally, books mirror and shape culture and sense of self, as well as build self-confidence and deepen understanding of the wider world. Finally, crucially, the "… book industry makes a significant contribution to the Australian economy… (and) … has a market size of $1.7 billion…" (Crosby, Throsby & Zwar, 2022).

So, why aren't we putting our writers and readers on metaphorical pedestals and asking them to write and read ALL the time?

Why aren't writing, and reading, recognised and valued through significant financial and societal rewards?

WritersBLOCK / ReadersBLOCK explores this conundrum of reading and writing – activities seen as hugely beneficial in many ways and which also come with significant personal and practical blocks to achieving them.

The 2022 National Survey of Australian Book Authors found Australian writers are struggling to exist, earning significantly below the poverty line and frequently needing extra employment. A key finding from the report was that "the average annual income from practising as an author is $18 200." It highlighted that authors need to find income from other sources, meaning "…writers typically spend only around half their working time producing original work." The survey also found that only "6% of authors reported that there are no competing demands for their writing time." Add into the mix that it takes a significant time to write a book – on average, around a year for a first draft of an 80 000 word novel - and that involved in any writing process are additional blocks of self-doubt, anxiety and fear, and writers face a lot of blocks to writing.

Some of the blocks writers may face are:

• insufficient income
• demands of another job
• domestic responsibilities
• not having a 'room of one's own' to write in
• not feeling valued
• not feeling it's a worthwhile use of their time
• illness or disability
• disillusion with writing and the industry
• lack of self-belief
• lack of self-discipline / focus
• anxiety around reaction to their work
• fear of AI stealing their work
• too many distractions
• other demands on their time.

WritersBLOCK takes away some of those blocks by providing a cosy room free of distractions, validation for the importance of writing, coffee, and some renumeration for the writer's time. The project explores how the writers inside the block react to this experience, and whether their blocks to writing are increased or decreased as a result.

I am also interested in the public's reaction – are you aware of the blocks writers face? Do you think about the act of writing differently after seeing this?

Please tell me your thoughts (QR code linking to website)

Reference

Creative Australia. (2022). National Survey of Australian Book Authors. 2022 National Survey of Australian Book Authors - Creative Australia | Creative Australia

The National Reading Survey, conducted by Australia Reads in 2021, found that reading rates in Australia are declining and that more than a quarter of Australians did not read or listen to a book in the previous year. The Head of Australia Reads, Anna Burkey, said that "…reading rates in Australia lag behind international standards." Further evidencing this, the European and International Book Federation compared Australia with 18 other countries and discovered that 64% of Australians purchased a book and 80% read a book in 2023, which put them below the other countries surveyed, with the average for the total 19 countries being 72% of global responders buying a book and 85% of responders reading a book in 2023. It's estimated to take only 4 and a half hours to read an average 80 000 word novel – a significantly less time than it takes to write one – but even so, there are many blocks readers experience when facing this task.

Some of the blocks readers may face are:

• lack of time
• finding reading difficult
• preferring other entertainment forms
• difficulty focusing
• trouble finding books that interest them
• lack of motivation
• distraction
• indifference to reading
• no easy access to books / books too expensive
• not having the right space for reading
• not feeling it's a valuable / worthwhile use of their time
• other priorities.

ReadersBLOCK takes away some of those blocks by providing a cosy free of distractions and with easy access to books, validation for the importance of reading, and some rewards for the readers' time. The project explores how the readers inside the block react to this experience, and whether their blocks to reading are increased or decreased as a result.

I am also interested in the public's reaction to reading – are you aware of the blocks readers face? Do you think about the act of reading differently after seeing this?

Please tell me your thoughts (QR code linking to website)

References

Australia Reads. (2021). Australian National Reading Survey. National Reading Survey | Australia Reads

Burkey, Anna., Reading in Australia: Where we are now, presentation at Volume Symposium, 21^st September, 2023

European and International Book Federation. (2024) Study on Consumer Behaviour: Book-buying trends, Reading habits, and Customer needs, PDD101355-RISE-Consumer-Study-Report.pdf

The project was born when I was up late at night with my new baby. By then, I'd been trying to finish my latest novel for several years. I felt extremely blocked, not only by being a new mother, but also by being time and space poor, low on funds, and uncomfortably attached to my phone. I wistfully gazed at the glossy website pictures of the repurposed shipping containers, reading about artwork to be displayed in the boxes, and a dangerous idea formed ...

Wouldn't it be great, I thought, to be stuck in a box with no distractions? Surely, I could write and finish my novel then! Perhaps the extra pressure of people watching me could be what I need to overcome my block! So, addled by sleeplessness and the desperation that only a writer who isn't writing can have, I made a plan. I'd overcome my writer's block by sitting in a glass box each day for a month.

Then, I started wondering about all the blocks I had for why I wasn't reading, either.

Finally, I wondered about the other writers and readers of Hobart and whether they were also struggling to make space for creating and ingesting stories. Soon, a wild new creative experiment was born.

The WritersBLOCK / ReadersBLOCK project will contribute to the field of creative praxis research around the resistance writers face while writing, drawing from works like Pressfield's The War of Art (2002) and Gilbert's Big Magic (2016), while also looking at current and local studies around the resistance that contemporary readers face, such as the 2021 Australian National Reading Survey.

The research aims are twofold.

Broadly, through surveying, the research will explore the blocks readers may face to reading and the blocks writers may face to writing. The research will be experiential in exploring whether the additional pressure of being watched by members of the public may help or hinder the process of reading and/or writing. I will explore whether the readers' and writers' blocks / resistance have increased or decreased by being part of the WritersBLOCK / ReadersBLOCK project.

I will also explore my own resistance / blocks to reading and, most particularly, my blocks to writing. I have been struggling to complete my current creative output, beginning work on it in 2022 and, during that time, rewriting the first 25 000 four times. Through a process of self-reflection, autoethnography and journalling, I will explore whether providing a space and dedicated time for writing, as well as adding the additional pressure of being watched, will help me produce, and be accountable to, the work.

Lucy Christopher is an award-winning author for children, young adults and adults. She was the Course Director for the renowned Writing for Young People MA at Bath Spa University and is now Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing at UTAS.

Lucy is using her time in the WritersBLOCK to develop her second novel for adults as well as be playful with her next picture book. Both projects are deeply influenced by wild places, and critically endangered animals, in Tasmania.

The main block Lucy faces to writing fiction is not having enough time.

Arianne James is a writer of fiction and avid reader. She currently coordinates TasWriters youth workshop program and hosts 'The Book Shelf' on Edge Radio where she interviews people from the Tasmanian literary community and beyond. She also runs 'Once Upon a Bookclub' at Fullers. Arianne's debut novel, 'Second Skin,' will be published by HQ/Harper Collins in 2026.

Arianne is using her time in the WritersBlock to develop her second novel, as well as work towards completing some of her unfinished short stories.

The main block Arianne faces to writing is distraction free time.

Tony is an illustrator, writer, and educator passionate about visual storytelling. With expertise in traditional art techniques and a deep understanding of narrative structure, Tony is currently developing Divi & Frey and the Curse of Anubis, an adventure graphic novel that blends rich world-building with dynamic storytelling. His work reflects a meticulous approach to composition, atmosphere, and character-driven narratives. He believes that creativity thrives on discipline, setting aside time each day to maintain momentum and avoid writer's block. Whether mentoring students or crafting compelling stories, Tony remains dedicated to fostering engagement through impactful, immersive storytelling techniques.

Dr Liz Evans is an award-winning writer and researcher from the UK. Throughout the 1990s, she was a rock journalist in London then retrained as a psychodynamic psychotherapist and moved to Australia in 2006. She holds a PhD in Creative Writing from UTAS where she has taught units in English and Writing, and Sustainability. She is a literary critic for The Conversation, and her debut novel, Catherine Wheel, was published last year by Ultimo Press.

In the WritersBLOCK, Liz is working on her second novel, a story of rivalry, competition and envy between Luella and Jini, two women in a band, struggling to survive within the deeply misogynistic world of the 1990s music industry.

Familiar with the concept of the 'difficult second album', Liz is discovering this is also true of writing novels. It's the closest she's come to feeling blocked.

Graeme Miles has published three collections of poems: Infernal Topographies (University of Western Australia Press, 2020), Recurrence (John Leonard Press, 2012) and Phosphorescence (Fremantle Press, 2006), as well as many pieces in journals and anthologies. His most recent book was shortlisted in the Tasmanian Literary Awards and his first for the West Australian Premier's Prize. He has lived in Hobart since 2008 and teaches Latin and ancient Greek literatures at the University of Tasmania. His scholarly work is in ancient Greek literature and philosophy.

Graeme's main barrier to writing is a very busy and engrossing day job, which feels intensely worthwhile in itself but can distract from the equally important work of writing creatively. In the block he will be working alternately on his new poetry collection and a novel which belongs to the genre of retellings of myth.

Kate Kruimink is a writer from the Huon. She is the author of three books – A Treacherous Country, Heartsease, and Astraea – and has received such literary awards as the Vogel, The Tasmanian Premier's Prize for Fiction, and the Weatherglass Books Novella Award. She is the Fiction Editor for Island Magazine, and her own short fiction, poems and essays have been published widely.

Kate is using her time in WritersBLOCK to chip away at her next novel, for which she received a grant from Creative Australia.

Her main blocks to writing are a lack of time and focus.

Ben Walter is a Walkley Award-winning essayist, a past fiction editor at Island, and the author of the short story collection, What Fear Was. His writing is forthcoming in The Kenyon Review (US) and has recently appeared in Poetry Ireland Review, The Cimarron Review (US) and 3:AM Magazine (France). His debut poetry collection, Lithosphere, is being published later this year.

Ben will use his time in the WritersBLOCK to work on experimental nature fiction inspired by the journals of Tasmanian bushwalker, Jack Thwaites.

The main block Ben faces to writing fiction is the weight of competing demands on his brain.

TBC

I have published one novel with Forty South (The Blue Cathedral) and three collections of poetry, as well as having two plays professionally produced in Tasmania. My second novel The Sand won the 2022 University of Tasmania Prize at that year's Premiers' Literary Awards for Best Unpublished Manuscript, from a field of over seventy entries. I completed a Doctorate of Creative Arts (Writing) through the Uni of Wollongong in 2021 and the thesis from that work was published internationally by Routledge as Curated Fiction: Novel Writing in Theory and Practice, in 2024.

I am at the very beginning stages of a new novel project, loosely incorporating elements of time travel, and two murders--one that occurs at Port Arthur in in the late 1840s and one in contemporary lutruwita/Tasmania.

Blocks...I have been what I would call a 'reset' over the last few months, where I have written very little. I completed a new play at the end of last year and was crippled by a) how difficult it was to write, and b) how few opportunities there are currently for new theatre, especially text-based, there are currently in Tasmania.

Danielle Wood is the author of the Vogel Prize-winning novel The Alphabet of Light and Dark, the fairy-tale inspired short fiction collections Rosie Little's Cautionary Tales for Girls and Mothers Grimm and the biography, Housewife Superstar: the very best of Marjorie Bligh. As 'Minnie Darke', she's written the novels Star-crossed, The Lost Love Song, With Love from Wish & Co and Three Juliets. She has also co-written children's fiction and co-edited of two anthologies of Tasmanian writing. She gets blocked when the things she can see in her imagination seem too beautiful for her to capture on a page. In the BLOCK, she'll be working on a children's novel about the evils of neoliberalism.