Mayoral Reception - Celebrating Tasmanian writers in 2021
The Lord Mayor hosted a reception at the Hobart Town Hall to celebrate the amazing achievements of Tasmanian based writers in 2021, during which 17 writers have been awarded or shortlisted for 25 national literary prizes.
Hobart, and Tasmania as a whole, has long been a heart of creative writing. Australia's first book being published in Hobart in 1818, an account by Thomas Wells of the bushranger Michael Howe. The first novel and book of essays were also published in Hobart in 1831.
Opening in 1837, the Theatre Royal is Australia's oldest continuing theatre, with a rich history of bringing literature to life.
Image gallery
Tasmania's list of writing honours for 2021
Robbie Arnott – The Rain Herron
- Winner of the 2021 Age Book of the Year
- Shortlisted in the Miles Franklin Awards 2021
Michael Bennett – War Against Smallpox
- Shortlisted for the NSW Premier's Prize
Christina Booth – One Careless Night
- Winner of the Picture Fiction Award at 2020 Environment Award For Children's Literature
Andrew Darby – Flight Lines
- Shortlisted for the Prime Minister's Literary Awards non-fiction 2021
Kate Kruimink – A Treacherous Country
- Winner of the 2020 Vogel Literary Award
- Shortlisted for the Prime Minister's Literary Awards fiction 2021
Anne Morgan (author) and Lois Bury (author) – The Way of the Weedy Seadragon
- Winner of the 2021 Whitley Award for the best Children's Natural History Book
Cassandra Pybus – Truganini
- Winner of the State Library of NSW National Biography Award
- Shortlisted for the Prime Minister's Literary Awards non-fiction 2021
Henry Reynolds – Truth Telling
- Winner of the Scholarly Non-Fiction Book of the Year
- Selected as one of five books of the year for presentation to the Prime Minister by Grattan Institute
- Shortlisted for the Queensland Premiers Prize
- Shortlisted for the Australian Education Publishing Awards
Daniel Sih – Space Maker - How to unwind and think clearly in the digital age
- Winner of the Australian Business Book of the Year Award 2021 (Best Personal Development Book)
- Finalist of the Australian Business Book of the Year Award 2021 (Best Technology Book)
- Finalist of the Australian Business Book of the Year Award 2021 (Best Business Book Cover)
Tim Slade – The Walnut Tree
- Shortlisted for Disability Awards (Arts)
Lian Tanner – Ella and the Ocean
- 2020 winner of the Patrica Wrightson Prize for Children's Literature
Adam Thompson – Born into this
- Shortlisted for the USQ Steele Rudd Award for a Short Story Collection and the 2021 Age Book of the Year Award
Richard Flanagan – The Living Sea of Waking Dreams
- Shortlisted in the Victorian Premier's Literary Awards 2021
Pete Hay – Forgotten Corners: Essays in Search of an Island's Soul
- Winner of the 2021 Book of the Year (Small Press Network)
Nicola Ingram
- Winner of the 2021 Emerging Tasmanian Aboriginal Writers Award
Amanda Lohrey – The Labyrinth
- Winner of the Miles Franklin Award 2021
- Shortlisted for the Prime Minister's Literary Awards fiction 2021
Heather Rose – Bruny
- Shortlisted for the 2020 ABIA Fiction Book of the Year