Funding dramas
Sophie Cunningham
December 22
There has been a bit of a flurry of debate (Simons, Rundle, Salusinszky) following Quadrant's drop in funding this year, and their consequent circulation of a letter which asserts that the during the years of the Howard government, the literature board of the Australia Council has never reduced the funding of 'overtly left-wing publications like Meanjin, Overland and Australian Book Review. In fact those three journals always received more money than Quadrant even though they carry a fraction of our literary content.'
I do feel compelled to make a public comment - Meanjin was on the amount of money that Quadrant has been cut back to for many years. Nor is it true that ABR, Meanjin or Overland publish 'a fraction' of the literary content simply because Quadrant is bi-monthly. It is frustrating that the media reports Quadrant's editor's Keith Windschuttle's claims without double checking them, as the Age did today.
Meanjin went up to $40,000 last year after we changed our approach to funding applications. This year we got $50,000 – again we put a huge amount of work into our application to try and have more success in these matters. This increased funding was, in part, a recognition of the collaborative work Meanjin has done, with Overland and with others, and I quote - ‘In supporting the literary magazines, the Board was very pleased to see collaborations arising, with subscription drives and joint offers, and with reading and promotion projects.’ To encourage subscribers to withdraw support from other journals, as Quadrant's letter implicitly does, in no way encourages the variousness of literary culture - something that Quadrant claims to stand for. And yes, I have had a subscription withdrawn in 'protest' at Quadrant losing funding.
Our Friends
- Overland
- Alien Onion
- Ampersand Duck
- Andrew McDonald
- A Pair of Ragged Claws
- Arts Victoria
- Australia Council for the Arts
- Ben Eltham
- Bookshow blog
- CAL
- City of Tongues
- Crikey
- darkly wise, rudely great
- David Astle
- Elmo Keep Does Stuff
- The Ember
- Fly the Falcon blog
- Going Down Swinging
- Griffith Review
- Hackpacker
- Harvest
- HEAT
- Island
- Killings blog
- Literary Minded
- Lorraine Crescent
- Lynden Barber
- Mandy Ord
- Marcus Westbury
- Matilda
- Meanland
- Melbourne University Publishing
- Mel Campbell
- The Monthly
- Musings of an Inappropriate Woman
- Oslo Davis
- Paul Callaghan
- Read, Think, Write
- Sleepers Publishing
- Sorrow at Sills Bend
- SPLOG
- Tom Cho
- Virgule
- Wet Ink
- Wheeler Centre
Comments
22 Dec 09 at 17:14
Given Quadrant has existed since 1956 and is still unable to stand on its own through sales and subscriptions, Mr Windschuttle should perhaps be grateful his magazine receives any funding at all. Meanjin and Overland at least promote a significant engagement with the modern world in order to constantly justify their level of funding. There are now a number of excellent journals and magazines in Australia that contribute a lot more than Quadrant do to the literary community yet receive no funding whatsoever. Mr Windschuttle's sense of entitlement to 50K of government funds for his stumbling Brontosaur of a magazine is sorely misplaced and his reaction to the redirection of funds to Griffith Review and Wet Ink is typical of the establishment's unwillingness to move with the times.
...22 Dec 09 at 18:00
I've found over many years, three of them as a member of it, that the more autopilot squealing an editor or author does over Lit Board funding, particularly if they claim it's about bias (and there are regular outbreaks of this kind of thing), the less they actually know about Lit Board policy, procedures and practices. If they ever bothered to inform themselves, they'd know how difficult it would be to implement such bias and make it stick, even if you wanted to.
'It is frustrating that the media reports Quadrant's editor's Keith Windschuttle's claims without double checking them, as the Age did today.' I think 'frustrating' is putting it kindly.
...22 Dec 09 at 23:08
I'm not sure how the Lit Board calculates its funding, I'd hope their modelling is based on contributions made to society. Why would a right wing publication need funding, surely their targetted demographic would have enough blood money to support their diatribe. I say base the funding on strength of character and fortitude, which should at least double the funding to Meanjin, and totally squash anything going to Quadrant.
...02 Jan 10 at 15:09
Fair enough comment, SC. It's a mug's game whining about funding and as Kerryn Goldsworthy points out, all it ever really achieves is to make those on the losing end look like uninformed sooks.
Mea culpa, in my case, in this instance, having had an intemperate grizzle elsewhere.
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