Hear From Australia's Most Promising Young Writers in a New SBS Podcast
Seven short stories about the Australian high school experience.
Listen to some of Australia's best emerging and early-career writers in a new podcast series produced by SBS. A tie in with the station's new crime-drama The Principal, which is set to premiere in the first week of October, True Stories consists of seven short stories written and performed by up-and-coming writers from all walks of life. Each story presents a different take on the Australian high school experience – and the six they've dropped so far have been really, really good.
The young writers worked in collaboration with Sweatshop, a literary initiative by the University of Western Sydney founded by doctoral candidate and writer Michael Mohammed Ahmad. Ahmad also wrote one episode of the podcast, as did his fellow recipients of the SMH's Best Young Novelist award Luke Carman, Maxine Beneba Clarke, Omar Musa and Ellen Van Neervan.
"I think the particular writers that SBS has engaged with are probably the best suited in the country to conform and adapt to the oral storytelling that these podcasts require," says Ahmad. "We're talking about the best up-and-coming writers in the country, and it just so happens that a vast majority of those writers represent traditions who come from rich oral storytelling practice. Omar Musa from a Malaysian background, Maxine Beneba Clarke an Afro-Caribbean background, Ellen van Neerven an Aboriginal background and myself an Arab background...if you look at our novels there is a strong oral technique that is being used most of the time, which is drawing from traditions that come from all over the world."
You can certainly feel the influence of these different cultural backgrounds in the content of True Stories. Ahmad's episode, for example, was inspired by his time as a student at Punchbowl Boys High School during the late nineties and early two thousands, a time when the "Arab Australian Muslim community was one of the most stigmatised groups in the country." Loaded with profane language and instances of violence, his story reflects a troubled period in the school's history, yet refuses to indulge stereotypes about the students or their community.
"I think if you listen to my story, there is undoubtedly an exploration of violence, sexism, misogyny, homophobia and classic cases of aggression and hostility that exist within certain underclass communities," Ahmad says. "But they're resilient spaces. They're not spaces that are miserable. The people in those spaces are intelligent, critical. They're aware of their circumstances, and most of the time they're responding, or even performing their underclass-ness, because that can be empowering."
"It's very hard, I think, for the white imagination to see those places as joyful, resilient, critically conscious places," he continues. "I think there is an assumption that under every poor young man of colour is a middle class white boy yearning to break free."
You can currently find the first six episodes of True Stories on the SBS website and on iTunes. The Principal premieres on Wednesday October 7 at 8:30pm.
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