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Merlinda Bobis Merlinda Bobis i(A33568 works by) (a.k.a. Merlinda Carullo Bobis; Merlinda C. Bobis; Merlin Bobis)
Born: Established: 1959 Legazpi City,
c
Philippines,
c
Southeast Asia, South and East Asia, Asia,
;
Gender: Female
Arrived in Australia: 1991
Heritage: Filipina
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BiographyHistory

Merlinda Bobis was born in the Philippines and taught for ten years at two universities and a tertiary college in Manila. She completed a Doctorate in Creative Arts at the University of Wollongong, where she became a senior lecturer in Creative Writing.

Merlinda Bobis has published two novels, a short story collection, five poetry books, a monograph of lectures on writing a novel and various stories, poems, plays and articles in literary anthologies, journals and magazines. She has had dramatic works performed for both stage and radio in Australia, Philippines, France, China, Thailand and Slovakia. She is an accomplished performer of her own works, embodying text in theatre, music and dance. She has won more than a dozen national and international awards and fellowships for her writing.

Most Referenced Works

Notes

  • Note: Bobis's first two books of poetry were published shortly before her arrival in Australia.
  • Author writes in these languages: ENGLISH, PILIPINO, and BIKOL (her local dialect).

Personal Awards

2006 Gawad ni Balagtas (The Balagtas Award) This is a a lifetime award for poetry and prose fiction in English and Pilipino.
2000 New South Wales Writer's Fellowship fiction
1998 Philippine Pamana Presidential Award

Awards for Works

y separately published work icon The Kindness of Birds North Melbourne : Spinifex Press , 2021 21212392 2021 selected work short story

'An oriole sings to a dying father. A bleeding-heart dove saves the day. A crow wakes a woman’s resolve. Owls help a boy endure isolation. Cockatoos attend the laying of the dead. Always there are birds in these linked stories that pay homage to kindness amidst loss, grief, discord and displacement, from Australia to the Philippines, across cultures and species. When we encounter that snag in the breath, that shadow of a wing, we hope to remember kindness. 

'Kindness cannot self-isolate. It moves both ways and all ways, like breath.'

Source : publisher's blurb

2021 winner Canberra Critics Circle Awards Writing
2022 finalist Australian Capital Territory Book of the Year Award
2022 shortlisted Queensland Literary Awards University of Southern Queensland Australian Short Story Collection – Steele Rudd Award
2021 shortlisted ACT Notable Awards Fiction Big Press
2022 shortlisted New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards Christina Stead Prize for Fiction
y separately published work icon Accidents of Composition North Melbourne : Spinifex Press , 2017 11622973 2017 selected work poetry

'The eyes catch a black bird close to an eerie sun. Instantly, a poem: an accident of composition. Or a tree, rock, light from a story heard, dreamt, read or remembered returns as if it were the only tree, rock, light in the planet. The poet is caught, returned to her first heart: poetry. after four novels, Merlinda offers seventy-six poems from the stillness of contemplation to the spinning of tales, then to passage across different histories. Glass becomes eternal greens underwater, fish gossip about colonisation, a gumnut turns dissident, and the dreams of Captain Cook and Pigafetta circumnavigate the globe leaving a trail of blood, beads, and the scent of cloves. But between, the port hopes: 'there could be accidents of kindness here.' In her latest collection of poetry, award-winning author Merlina Bobis traces the accidents of art and life. Drawing on the journal of Pigafetta whose writings have become an accident of history, Merlinda Bobis composes with an attuned ear and her poems are rich with imagery; with breath and heart.'  (Publication summary)

2018 shortlisted Australian Capital Territory Book of the Year Award
y separately published work icon Locust Girl : A Lovesong North Melbourne : Spinifex Press , 2015 8597660 2015 single work novel fantasy

'Most everything has dried up: water, the womb, even the love among lovers. Hunger is rife, except across the border. One night, a village is bombed after its men attempt to cross the border. Nine-year old Amedea is buried underground and sleeps to survive. Ten years later, she wakes with a locust embedded in her brow. This political fable is a girl’s magical journey through the border. The border has cut the human heart. Can she repair it with the story of a small life? This is the Locust Girl’s dream, her lovesong—

'For those walking to the border for dear life

'And those guarding the border for dear life'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

2016 winner New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards Christina Stead Prize for Fiction
2016 shortlisted Australian Capital Territory Book of the Year Award
Last amended 13 Mar 2018 13:52:01
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