Womenswords: No Apology: Subversive Women Poets

'There are many more histories than the one that is official, or given. There are different centres to different histories’. Griselda Pollock, art historian

In this presentation Joy will share the work of some Australian women poets, from the 1890s through to the present day, as they write, without apology, from a ‘different centre’.

Joy Phillips was born in Melbourne, lived for many years in the Northern Territory, and settled in Beechworth with her husband Alan upon retirement. Joy was on the inaugural committee of Indigo U3A in 2010, and still facilitates life writing and poetry sessions. Joy’s love affair with poetry began in Year 11, thanks to a passionate teacher of English, and was deepened during the very first English lecture at university, when the old professor sang the Scottish Ballads. She loves reading and listening to poetry, and writing it. For her, the poetic voice mostly needs to be worked at, but sometimes, to her surprise and gratitude, it arrives unbidden, and sings by itself upon the page.

Joy’s poems have been published in several collections, the most recent being A sense of place in 2017. She is currently working on her second collection.