Augusta Supple

When the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards were announced last month, there was one thing that no one expected… there was no shortlist for the Play Awards category.

Was no play worth even nomination? Surely this was a clerical error- had the envelope bearer had lost the nomination envelope in a taxi on the way to the announcement? Had there been a cut and paste error on the website?

Nope. No clerical error. A major philosophical one though- a major political one.

Instead $30K has been offered up, not as an award celebrating excellence- but has been transposed into a grant “to support professional development opportunities for new playwrights in 2011.”

No clerical error. But a major political error.

Development? Development? Sorry… What? No shortlist, but a grant for Development? more…