The Alice Award

On August 31st, 2018, I became the delighted recipient of the Alice Award; an award given to a female Australian writer for 'an outstanding long-term contribution to Australian literature’. The Alice is given out every two years by the Society of Women Writers... five state-based groups who each propose a candidate. The five nominees are measured against a checklist of attributes and the one who is deemed most worthy at the time receives the award. The Alice is a bronze statuette of Henry Lawson's Drover's Wife. The winner keeps Alice for two years, and then she goes on to the next winner. However, there is also a framed certificate.

To say I am honoured by this peer-judged award is an understatement. To be nominated is a great boost. To win, is enormous.

Previous winners include those listed in the photo. This clumsy attempt at Alice-capture took me ages, because Alice proved unexpectedly difficult to photograph. The dark bronze means it needs good lighting, but the reflective nature of the metal means it shows light bounce and reflects everything in range. The names are engraved in different styles, and some barely show up in a photo, though they do in reality.

My journey to the Alice must have started when I started writing, because I do indeed have a sustained output. I've been writing for fun for 54 years, and for publication for 49. Anyone wanting to see and to read about my books might catch up with my other blog, http://behindsallysbooks.blogspot.com

Wendy of the Tasmanian branch of the Society of Women Writers sent me an email to see if I would accept nomination for the 2018 award. I did, and then put it out of my mind. All the background work is done by the nominating branch, not by the nominees. The next I heard was when Wendy suggested I really ought to go to the award lunch... and that the host branch would make the arrangements.

The Victorian society members made me most welcome. Razmi met me at the station and we had afternoon tea and a good talk on writing. I had a chance to read her poem, The Blue Beanie, which says so much in so few words. Seeing how clueless I was about direction, she arranged to meet me again in the morning to conduct me to the library for the SWW meeting and award lunch. At the venue, I met Blaise, the outgoing president who had made the arrangements for my visit, Clare, the 2016 Alice winner who spoke about her tenure and Hazel, whom I've known for years, and who is the patron of the society. There were a great many people to talk to, and, typically, I didn't always catch the names until later when I reflected and thought, oh, of course! That was... insert name of a writer I have heard of, read, admired, or had correspondence with in the past. There were Harriet and Margaret, Errol, Jenny and several whose faces I can visualise but whose names I didn't hear or can't match to the face. There were two writers from WA, and the lovely Wendy who had come across on the ferry to represent the Tasmanian society. There was food, tea, a lovely cake which I got to cut, a framed certificate and Alice herself, the bronze lady who accompanied me home in a long box and who caused a little consternation at the airport when she sailed through the scanner lying in state in her wrappings, was stopped, backed up, and re-scanned.

"Madam, what is this?"
"The Alice Award I just won."
"Is it sharp?"
"Not very."

My speech...

Alice was duly released into my custody and came home to be introduced to my husband.

SO... who was the original Alice? That was curiously difficult to discover, but Hazel Edwards did some research and uncovered the history of the award. That however, is the subject for another blog.

Are all posts going to be about the Alice Award? No, but all will be about Alice... an Alice, the Alice, the connotations, history, image and general Aliceness of Alice. I hope you'll join me in my journey into the Alice Affair.




About the Blog
This is a blog about all things Alice, constructed by Sally Odgers, winner of the 2018 Alice Award. My home page is at https://sallybyname.weebly.com where you'll find the gateway to my maze of websites and blogs. You can contact me in the comments section of this blog, or via the details given at my home page.