Mary Norris

Copy editor and grammar nerd Mary Norris has seen the fabled linguistic traditions of the New Yorker up close – she has worked at the magazine for 40 years, most famously as query proofreader and Comma Queen. That experience forms the backbone of her first book, Between You & Me. ‘I hope writers will see that we are not the enemy,’ she has said of her profession. ‘We love the language.’

In her latest book, Greek to Me, Norris shares her love of all things Greek. Of course, it’s about language – how the Greeks adapted the Phoenician alphabet, and the surprising ways Greek informs English – but it also documents Norris’s encounters with Greek gods, wine, men, and olive groves. Myths are reinterpreted; landmarks are sought out; beautiful coincidences of word and symbol are excavated.

Mary Norris returned to Melbourne for a chat about her travels through Greek language, culture and art (and, of course, so much more) with Penny Modra.

Penny Modra and Mary Norris

Eloise Grills at the Deakin Edge — Photo: Jon Tjhia

Melbourne has always been a city of literature. Our population is bursting with rabid readers and writers. We have the best libraries, the coolest bookshops, the finest festivals and some truly pioneering publishers. Also, Monkey Grip is set here and we are the best at wearing turtlenecks.

So it made perfect sense when, in 2008, Melbourne joined the UNESCO Creative Cities Network and made it official – becoming a designated City of Literature in recognition of our literary spirit. 

For the tenth anniversary of this designation, we kicked off the celebrations with a gala night of readings and storytelling at Deakin Edge. We heard from ten brilliant writers – both established and emerging – who have made Melbourne home for either a short time or a lifetime. Where, for them, does Melbourne come alive on the page? Which classic stories and scenes of Melbourne are part of our literary DNA, and how are a new generation of writers remaking the city with words?

In order of appearance … hear from Alice Pung, Tony Birch, Jane Rawson, Eloise Grills, Moreno Giovannoni, Jennifer Down, Alexis Wright, Patricia Cornelius, Andy Griffiths and Sumudu Samarawickrama.

This event was presented in partnership with the Melbourne UNESCO City of Literature Office.

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Family, literature, Papua New Guinea and the complicated lives of creative women –  these are the themes to which Drusilla Modjeska has repeatedly returned in her impressive body of work. As a memoirist, essayist, novelist (and master of combining and confounding literary forms), Modjeska is among Australia’s most celebrated writers.

Most recently, she has added a memoir, Second Half First, to an already substantial list of literary accomplishments, including Exiles at Home, Poppy, Stravinsky’s Lunch and The Mountain. That book reflects on the books, people and journeys that have most profoundly affected her in the second part of her life.

At Montalto, Modjeska discusses travel, reading and the intersection of life and work with Andrea Goldsmith.

Books and Ideas at Montalto series sound design and music: Jon Tjhia.

Simon Winchester is a giant of narrative non-fiction. Across four decades of working as a journalist and author, Winchester’s reverence for the natural world and love of adventure have defined his extraordinary career. This is a man, after all, who has travelled on a Russian tramp steamer from Antarctica to England and seen the inside of an Argentine jail cell.

As a foreign correspondent during the 1970s and 1980s, Winchester covered major international events including the Troubles in Northern Ireland, the Watergate scandal and the Falklands War, and is the author of books on a dizzying array of subjects. He’s written about the history of the Yangtze River, the eruption of Krakatoa and, perhaps most famously, the making of the Oxford English Dictionary in the bestselling The Surgeon of Crowthorne.

Winchester’s timely new book, Pacific, profiles the world’s largest ocean and considers its crucial role in the planet’s present and future. From the Bikini atoll hydrogen bomb tests of the 1950s to the rise of China as a global economic superpower, Winchester explores the history of the Pacific – and the countries that border it.

Join us for a conversation with one of the most prolific, polymathic writers of our time, hosted by Sophie Black.

Books and Ideas at Montalto series sound design and music: Jon Tjhia.