3 Indigenous Taiwanese writers to join Melbourne festival

Taipei, Aug. 28 (CNA) Three Indigenous Taiwanese writers will take part in Australia's Emerging Writers' Festival in Melbourne in September, the National Museum of Taiwan Literature (NMTL) said Friday.

Bunun writer Neqou Soqluman (乜寇.索克魯曼), Amis writer Ado Kaliting Pacidal (阿洛.卡力亭.巴奇辣) and Truku writer Apyang Imiq (程廷) will participate in five events during the festival, which runs from Sept. 10-18, the NMTL said in a news release.

The NMTL said it will be the museum's first involvement with the festival, which was established in 2003 and is regarded as a major Australian platform for emerging writers and interdisciplinary performances.

According to the museum, the three writers will join international forums and performances combining literature, readings, music and discussions as well as engage with writers, publishers and readers from Australia and other countries.

Their forum topics will include how writers make a living, their responsibilities when writing about others and what distinguishes fiction as an art form.

Neqou writes about Indigenous ecological knowledge, hunting culture and mythology, while Ado, also a musician and filmmaker, works across media to preserve and practice Indigenous culture, the NMTL said.

Apyang, meanwhile, explores personal history, collective tribal memory, identity and connections between tradition and contemporary life through his writing and community work in Hualien's Ciyakang community.

The museum said it will also publish an English-language booklet containing translated excerpts from the three writers' works for distribution at the festival.

The excerpts will later be made available through the Taiwan Writers Festival and Taiwan Literature in Translation Repository websites, with the museum hoping to create opportunities for overseas publishing rights.

The trip is part of a partnership the NMTL established with the Melbourne UNESCO City of Literature Office in 2024.

As part of the reciprocal program, Australian First Nations writers and literary curators will visit Taiwan for the 2026 Taiwan Writers Festival in November, the museum said.