Anne O'Brien says people's hunger to discuss how the world works is at its zenith right now. Photo / Jason Oxenham
Anne O'Brien says people's hunger to discuss how the world works is at its zenith right now. Photo / Jason Oxenham
Auckland Writers Festival director Anne O'Brien is most proud of bringing author Haruki Murakami to speak but says Leonard Cohen is 'the one that got away'.
1. Attendance at last year's festival was over 75,000. Why do Aucklanders like writers festivals so much?
Writers festivals around the world are doing well at the moment. People are keen to engage in public discourse at a time when that has retracted in some ways. The desire to take part in live conversation about who we are and how the world works is really of its time right now.
2 Is your line-up skewed to the liberal left-wing?
I consciously try to put as broad a spectrum of views on stage as possible. I don't think it's useful just hearing things you already agree with - that's an echo chamber. It's where you disagree that you get to test your assumptions and progress your thoughts on how you see the world. It is true that writers festivals can skew slightly liberal but it's not for want of trying. Speakers from the right are more inclined to ask for corporate-level fees which festivals can't afford.
3 So much can go wrong when staging over 200 talks across six days. What's been the worst mishap?
Our biggest challenge is keeping all the writers intact from the time we contract them until their arrival. Two years ago we had four internationals pull out for a variety of reasons; some health, some other commitments. That's a nightmare. This year nobody's withdrawn so far, but someone will for sure. I'm getting slightly better at not feeling so bereft when that happens.
4 Of the seven festivals you've run, which writer has surprised you the most?
The writers that surprise you most are the ones you don't really know who seem to erupt out of nowhere. Emma Sky was one of those. I'd gone to New York to see Joe Klein speak at a wine loft and this young English woman got up; she'd gone to Iraq as an activist and become a special adviser to two American generals. Her story and the way she told it was simply extraordinary so I went up afterwards and asked her to come to New Zealand. People often say yes and they don't mean it but she did.
5 Which writer are you most proud of securing?
Haruki Murakami - because he doesn't do many appearances. I'd spent 14 years sending letters off and on. Every festival director in the world had offered him this and that with no luck but I'm quite tenacious and every so often I'd think, 'Oh what the hell, I'll just send another one'. One day I got a message back from an agent saying he was thinking about coming. I couldn't believe it! I was almost too nervous to watch his session at first. Long pauses between the questions and the answers were making me feel a bit angsty until I realised he was having to do the translations in his head. Once I got used to that, the session came to have the same meditative quality and dreamlike flow of reading Murakami, so it was very special.
6 Who was the one that got away?
Leonard Cohen. I'd been trying to get him to speak about his writing ever since I produced Nine to Noon with Kim Hill on National Radio. I once sent him a Buddhist prayer scarf I was given when I lived in India and a piece of greenstone donated by my sister who loves Leonard too. I sent it to him saying 'Please come Leonard'. He didn't say yes, but he did send me a book which says, 'Dear Anne, thank you for the precious gifts, Leonard'. It's one of my most treasured!
Auckland Writer's Festival director Anne O'Brien. Photo / Jason Oxenham
7 This year's big names include Jeff Tweedy, Kate Raworth, Antony Beevor and John Boyne. Of all the talks, which are you personally looking forward to most?
There are always little things in the programme that are your 'heart' things. This year for me it's a session called The New 90. Renee Hollis interviewed 120 New Zealanders over 100 years old about their lives for her book Keepers of History and we have three of them coming to talk on Sunday morning.
8 Writers festivals are often marred by annoying audience questions. How do you minimise those?
Questions are one of two major bugbears for festivals. Last year was particularly bad - there were a lot of complaints. We've considered getting rid of them but some writers like engaging with readers so if they're happy to take questions we get the chair to give the audience very clear guidelines and to cut people off politely. Some festivals pre-scan the questions but we don't have the resources to do that. The other bugbear is choosing the right chair. We aim to reflect the range of writers but in the end chair people are facilitators. They need to be good at live, long on-stage interviewing which is much harder to do than it looks.
9 Growing up in Wellington, were you always into books?
I grew up in a big rambling old house in Hataitai with lots of books. Mum took us to the library every Friday night. One of my first jobs was at a library but my career has been very eclectic. On my OE I worked in the financial sector for a few years. I've been a mediator at the Human Rights Commission, a radio journalist, publicist and events producer.
10 Why did you move to Auckland from Wellington's Arts Festival?
My partner Jonathan Alver got a job directing Shortland St, so I ran a not-for-profit for a few years before taking on the Writer's Festival in 2011. We're a fulltime team of five. I manage the finances and curate the programme but we've grown so much that it's becoming untenable. In the last seven years the turnover's more than doubled to $2 million and the attendance has tripled. We're up there with Sydney in terms of audience.
11 Is your festival bankrolled by the same handful of philanthropists that fund most of our arts events?
Over 10 per cent of our turnover comes from our group of patrons which has more than tripled since we began. Corporate sponsorship is tougher but we do okay. Only 2 per cent of our funding comes from Auckland Council, compared with 25 and 30 per cent in Sydney and Melbourne. Auckland has some equity issues around cultural funding that need to be sorted, and we're having lots of discussions with the council about that.
12 How do you think Auckland is doing culturally compared to Wellington?
I am very Wellingtonian; I love that village-but-city feel. Auckland is so dependent on cars. People tend to live in their spots and not engage in the middle. We saw that change with the Rugby World Cup when people came into the city to be part of the celebration. With population growth we're starting to reach more of a critical mass. We've established a fantastic cultural precinct which comes alive with festivals and the like, Auckland is really functioning like a culturally rich city.
