Alan Wearne, 2004
Photo by John Tranter
Alan Wearne Contents page
Alan Wearne (b.1948) studied history at Monash University in the late 1960s. His first book of poems was Public Relations (1974). His award-winning verse novel The Nightmarkets (1986) has been adapted for the stage. His verse novel The Lovemakers was divided in half by Penguin Australia. Book One, Saying All The Great Sexy Things, was published in 2001 to critical acclaim winning the Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry, the New South Wales Premier’s Prize Book of the Year and the Arts Queensland Judith Wright Calanthe Award for Australian Poetry. Book Two, Money and Nothing was later published by ABC Books. Alan teaches at the University of Wollongong and was for three years a teaching fellow at Curtin University of Technology.
Material available on this site:
Alan Wearne: from The Lovemakers Book Two, "Making the World Revolve (i)". A twelve-sestina excerpt. [18pp]
Alan Wearne: from The Lovemakers Book Two, "Making the World Revolve (ii)". A thirteen-sestina excerpt. [18pp]
Alan Wearne: from The Lovemakers Book Two, Part Fifteen: Epilogue: ‘Those were strange days, strange days indeed!’ A one-sestina excerpt. [2pp]
What is a sestina?
(on the Poetic Forms section of this site.)
Alan Wearne: What You Are About To Hear... (about a CD of ‘The Lovemakers’) [3pp]
Alan Wearne: ‘Spirit and Action’ — some thoughts on John Forbes. [6pp]
John Tranter reviews New Devil, New Parish, poems by Alan Wearne; UQP Paperback Poets Second Series, $1.50 (paper). First published in The Australian, 11 June 1977. [3pp]
John Tranter’s 1974 review of Alan Wearne’s Public Relations and other books, in the Survey Articles section of this site. [3pp]
You can read a more detailed biographical note directly below.
Biographical note:
Alan Wearne (1948) has been part of Australian poetry since his Monash days (1967–68). His collections include Public Relations (1972) and New Devil, New Parish (1976) the latter containing the verse novella Out Here which was later presented as a radio play and republished in Britain in 1987 His award-winning verse novel The Nightmarkets (1986) has been adapted for the stage and he has written a prose work, the fantasy-satire on Melbourne and its football culture Kicking In Danger (1997). In 1999 he hosted Conversations With a Dead Poet a television documentary about his late friend and colleague John Forbes.
His verse novel The Lovemakers was divided in half by Penguin Australia. Book One, Saying All The Great Sexy Things, was published in 2001 to critical acclaim winning the Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry, the New South Wales Premier’s Prize Book of the Year and the Arts Queensland Judith Wright Calanthe Award for Australian Poetry. As a reward the publishers pulped their remaining stock and declined to publish Book Two, Money and Nothing. This has since been published by ABC Books.
After a working life centred on a variety of occupations in Melbourne he now teaches at the University of Wollongong and was for three years a teaching fellow at Curtin University of Technology.
His one intellectual interest being history he is a graduate in that subject from LaTrobe University. Poetry being an enterprise for the elitist and the entertainer Alan tries combining both approaches.
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