FRIDAY 25 OCTOBER, 12:00 pm – 5:30 pm
THE CAPITOL SALON

Unleash your hidden wordsmith and become a part of our odyssey. Together, we’ll create a collaborative anthology in response to our 2024 festival theme, Phases/Futures. 

Visit us in the Salon and watch as your words evolve into a live literary installation. Prompts and bookish breadcrumbs await – use them for inspiration, or simply let your imagination run wild. 

See our completed audience anthology here.

FRIDAY 25 OCTOBER, 12:00 pm – 5:30 pm
THE CAPITOL SALON

Carl Sandburg said, ‘Poetry is an echo, asking a shadow to dance.’ 

Paper scraps and pens = ultimate possibility. Craft a future or leave an echo by adding a line to our collaborative poem. 

Pick up a prompt in the Salon and see where it takes you. Stay for the evening and watch your words dance. Our poets will weave your lines into a piece to be performed on stage during Talk to the body: poetry in motion.

FRIDAY 25 OCTOBER, 12:00 pm – 5:30 pm
THE CAPITOL SALON

A homage to Ania Walwicz (1951-2020): poet, playwright, visual artist, philosopher, cat lover and beloved RMIT PWE teacher.

Ania’s life is impossible to distil into mere sentences; instead, join us in a tribute to her boundless influence on Australian literature and the arts.

Visit the Salon to view Ania performing her work in archival footage generously supplied by Katherine FitzHywel, Ross Digby, Annie Solah, Jason Sweeney, Andrée Greenwell, Peter Knight, Simon Grounds and Roman Tucker. See full credits and attributions here.

FRIDAY 25 OCTOBER, 12:00 pm – 5:30 pm
THE CAPITOL SALON

Let the hunt begin! In this interactive event we honour RMIT PWE legend Fiona Scott-Norman: writer, comic, chicken-fancier and fashion icon. 

Get your game face on and visit the Salon to see what’s roosting...egg-ceptionally observant guests will be rewarded. 

FRIDAY 25 OCTOBER, 12:00 pm – 5:30 pm
THE CAPITOL SALON

What will our future look like: Hunger Games, 1984 or The Handmaid’s Tale? Will we be overrun by Clickers or thrust into eternal silence? 

Close your eyes and cast your vote: which dystopia are we hurtling towards? Stick around for our final festival session, Imagine tomorrow: facing our fears through speculative fiction, to hear where the Odyssey audience thinks we’re headed. 

FRIDAY 25 OCTOBER, 12:00 pm – 5:30 pm
THE CAPITOL SALON

Mark the first digital edition of Visible Ink by hanging out with our friendly student editors, writers and publishers!

Visible Ink is RMIT’s very own literary magazine, with a legacy of over 30 years. Now revived after becoming an early casualty of the 2020 pandemic, Visible Ink’s vibrant 2024 return parallels that of Odyssey Literary Festival.

Visit the Visible Ink stall in the Salon to learn more about the magazine’s past, present and future – and while you’re there, peruse a story or two from the digital edition.