Samuel Wagan Watson – May 14 2017

Samuel is an award-winning poet and professional narrator and storyteller. The son of prominent Brisbane-based academic, writer and activist Sam Watson, Samuel has Irish, German, Dutch and Aboriginal (Munaldjali and Birri Gubba) ancestry. His collected works have been translated into seven languages, used in various musical compositions, the subject of film and television productions and public/visual art projects. In 1999 he won the David Unaipon Award for Emerging Indigenous Writers with his first collection of poetry, Of Muse, Meandering and Midnight. His later collections include Itinerant Blues, Hotel Bone and The Curse Words. Mixing his Indigenous culture with his love of Gothic horror, Samuel produced and performed the opera Die Dunkle Erde (‘The Dark Earth’) with composers William Barton and Stephen Leek. Samuel has been poet-in-residence for ABC TV’s ‘Sunday Arts’ and the Yarrabah community in North Queensland as well as artist-in-residence for the Indonesian ‘Utan Kayu’ Literary Biennale. In between writing and working on community projects, including poetry in the built environment (his poetry adorns the Eleanor Schonell bridge in St Lucia, Queensland), Samuel is a regular guest speaker, workshop facilitator and creative arts mentor. He has been a writer and script developer for 98.9FM Murri Country radio station in Brisbane and commissioned to write for a number of government and corporate entities including the Japanese Aeronautical Exploration Agency which commissioned him to develop haiku for the pleasure of astronauts living and working on the orbiting International Space Platform.

Love Poems and Death Threats
University of Queensland Press, 2014; ISBN 9780702253270

From acclaimed poet Samuel Wagan Watson comes a much-anticipated volume that is both wild and dynamic in its flair and vision, mapping the songlines — the poemlines — of an Australia scarred by invasion and injustice, but brimming, too, with the vital energies of creativity and resilience. The poems are dynamic, vivid and powerful, containing the clear language of witness reminiscent of Indigenous songwriters such as Kev Carmody and Dr Yunupingu.

Smoke Encrypted Whispers
University of Queensland Press, 2004; ISBN 9780702234712

The poems in Samuel Wagan Watson’s second poetry collection, pulse with the language and images of a mangrove-lined river city, the beckoning highway, the just-glimpsed muse, the tug of childhood and restless ancestors. For the first time Samuel Wagan Watson’s poetry has been collected into this stunning volume, which includes a final section of all new work.