The Kill Your Darlings launches

Issue One

by Rebecca Starford , March 16, 2010 • 1 Comment

It’s been a controlled sort of chaos for the Kill Your Darlings team for the last couple of weeks. Not only have we published and distributed our inaugural issue, but we have launched it in both Adelaide (as part of the Adelaide Writers’ Week program) and in Melbourne.

Riding in on the back of Philip Hoare’s enthralling account of whale-watching and his book, Leviathan, Kill Your Darlings launched Issue One to a packed-out West Tent in Adelaide on Friday 5 March. We’d like to extend a huge thanks to Charlotte Wood, acclaimed author of The Children and recently editor of Brothers and Sisters, who kindly agreed to launch us – and who spoke so eloquently and passionately about her appreciation of the Australian literary journal culture. And thank you, too, to Clementine Ford, who had us all laughing with her reading of ‘Love in a LOL-ed Climate’, which recounts her (disastrous) Internet dating experiences.

Pictured: Charlotte Wood, Deputy Editor Hannah Kent, Associate Editor Jo Case and Editor Rebecca Starford

On Thursday, we were delighted to launch the issue at that Melbourne lit-gig stable, Bella Union Bar, in Trades Hall. Thank you to our contributors Gideon Haigh and Emmett Stinson for reading from their respective pieces. And another huge thank you to Michael Williams, Head of Programming at the Wheeler Centre and general man-about-town, for launching the issue with his famous wit. (It seems unfair, doesn’t it, that the man can write, program incredible literary events and speak entertainingly in public?)

Issue One contributor Gideon Haigh reads at the Melbourne launch.

Most importantly, we’d like to thank everyone who came along to the launches and showed their support. We’d also like to thank everyone who helped in making Kill Your Darlings become a reality. Special thanks to all our families, and to Lorraine Harding, our business manager for the establishment period, who put in so many unpaid hours and contributed hugely to the concept of the journal; Anne-Marie Reeves, our very own designer extraordinaire and consulting editor for issue one; Martin Hughes at Affirm Press, for his continued support, encouragement and enthusiasm for Kill Your Darlings; Flinders University, for all its support; and all our editorial advisors, particularly Martin Shaw, who gave us invaluable commercial advice in starting up, contributes regularly to our blog and has been an excellent all-round KYD cheerleader.

So, stay tuned: the Kill Your Darlings website and blog under the guidance of online editor Estelle Tang will continue to grow – in its content and diversity. We look forward to bringing you Issue Two in July.