not in Aus, mate
bad things don't happen here
our beaches are open
they are not places where bloodied mattresses burn
Throatis the explosive second poetry collection from award-winning Mununjali Yugambeh writer Ellen van Neerven. Exploring love, language and land, van Neerven flexes their distinctive muscles and shines a light on Australia's unreconciled past and precarious present with humour and heart. Van Neerven is unsparing in the interrogation of colonial impulse, and fiercely loyal to telling the stories that make us who we are.
Ellen van Neerven is a Brisbane-based writer. She is the 2013 winner of the David Unaipon Award. Her first book, Heat and Light (UQP) was released in 2014. Divided into three sections, it is inspired by the intersection of familial history, location and identity.
Ellen’s writing has appeared widely in publications such as McSweeney’s, Review of Australian Fiction, The Lifted Brow, Meanjin, Ora Nui and Mascara Literary Review.
Ellen works at the State Library of Queensland as part of the black&write! Indigenous writing and editing project which aims to support and promote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander writers. Ellen is the editor of the digital collection Writing Black: New Indigenous Writing from Australia.
