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Michael Farrell Michael Farrell i(A3320 works by) (a.k.a. Michael John Farrell)
Also writes as: 'Dodi ‘Dodo’ Malley' ; 'Bradley Malley-Trushott' ; 'Veronica Malley'
Born: Established: 1965 Bombala, Bombala - Delegate area, Cooma - Snowy - Bombala area, Southeastern NSW, New South Wales, ;
Gender: Male
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BiographyHistory

Michael Farrell has lived in Sydney and Melbourne, spending much of his childhood on a farm. He has worked as an editorial assistant and poetry reader at Meanjin and as editor of Slope. He has written various performance works, including the play 'Up Here' which was performed at the Melbourne Fringe Festival in 1991 under his direction. Farrell's literary influences include Joyce, Brecht, Stein, ee cummings, and popular culture. His early rural experiences also colour his poetic work.

Farrell co-edited the anthology Out of the Box: Contemporary Australian Gay and Lesbian Poets which was published by Puncher & Wattmann in late 2009.

Farrell has completed a PhD at the University of Melbourne on experimental poetics in the nineteenth century and, in 2013, was a creative fellow at UNSW Canberra at the Australian Defence Force Academy.

Most Referenced Works

Personal Awards

Awards for Works

Hamlet In The Mind Of A Country Schoolteacher i "These words were in Adam’s head when he woke up, but", 2018 single work poetry
— Appears in: Hope for Whole : Poets Speak up to Adani 2018; (p. 18-20)
2017 joint winner Venie Holmgren Environmental Poetry Prize
Sock Puppet Ascendancy i "It was humanising, listening to a self speaking", 2018 single work poetry
— Appears in: Southerly , December vol. 78 no. 3 2018; (p. 167-169)
2018 shortlisted David Harold Tribe Poetry Award
y separately published work icon I Love Poetry Artarmon : Giramondo Publishing , 2017 11570289 2017 selected work poetry

'In I Love Poetry, Michael Farrell continues his affirmation of poetry as a mode for thinking: about Australia, land, and settlement, about planetary life, and about poetry’s relation to other art forms and to other kinds of writing. His poems show an aptitude for both fiction and (auto)biography. Playful and subtle in tone, they get under the skin of your mind more than in its face. ‘AC/DC as First Emu Prime Minister’ and ‘Into a Bar’ remobilise familiar Australian icons, while ‘Cate Blanchett and the Difficult Poem’ creates a scenario with the actor and Waleed Aly where reading and composition become a single act. ‘Great Poet Snowdome’ is a pervy story of kitsch involving Sydney and the pope, a recurring figure in the book who re-emerges as Pope Pinocchio. There’s a Tame Impala acrostic, a Mad Max riff (‘Put Your Helmet On’), a One Direction revision (‘Drag Me Down’), and forays into poeticising lyrebirds, kangaroos, Robert Menzies and Elizabeth Bishop. There is Sid Vicious and there are lamingtons. There is everything that loves poetry: Weet-Bix, Iron Maiden t-shirts, motorbikes, and you.' (Publication summary)

2018 highly commended Victorian Premier's Literary Awards Prize for Poetry
2019 shortlisted New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry
2018 commended Australian Centre Literary Awards Wesley Michel Wright Prize in Poetry
2018 winner Queensland Literary Awards Judith Wright Calanthe Award
Last amended 15 Nov 2021 11:37:25
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