News: Burning In shortlisted for the inaugural Prime Minister's Literary Awards, 2008 Age Book of the Year Award for Fiction, Commonwealth Writers' Prize, Nita B Kibble Literary Award and highly commended in the inaugural Barbara Jefferis Award. Not Finding Wittgenstein shortlisted for the 2008 Age Book of the Year Award for Poetry, the Australian Literature Society Gold Medal and the Adelaide Festival John Bray Award for Poetry. The Orphan Gunner shortlisted for the 2008 Age Book of the Year Award for Fiction and the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best First Book. Someone Else is the winner of the 2008 Adelaide Festival Award for Innovation. An Illustrated History of Dairies shortlisted for the 2008 NSW Premier's Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry.
The Giramondo Publishing Company was set up in December 1995 with the aim of publishing quality creative and interpretive writing by Australian authors. It seeks to build a common ground between the academy and the marketplace; to stimulate exchange between Australian writers and readers and their counterparts overseas; and to encourage innovative and adventurous work that might not otherwise find publication because of its subtle commercial appeal.
Initially these aims were expressed through the publication of the book-length literary journal HEAT, fifteen issues of which appeared between 1996 and 2000. Now in its second series, and appearing twice a year, HEAT has a national and international reputation as a showcase for contemporary writing from Australia, and from overseas, often in translation.
In November 2002 the Giramondo Publishing Company began the publication of literary works by individual authors in its Giramondo book imprint. Giramondo titles include prize-winning books by Emma Lew, Judith Beveridge, Brian Castro, Gerald Murnane, John Hughes, Jennifer Maiden and Alexis Wright. The most recent releases are the classic reprint Gerald Murnane, Tamarisk Row; new novels by Sara Knox, The Orphan Gunner and Mireille Juchau, Burning In; poetry by Lucy Dougan, White Clay, Alan Wearne, The Australian Popular Songbook, and Michael Farrell, a raiders guide; fictional essays by John Hughes, Someone Else; and in non-fiction, Antigone Kefala's Sydney Journals, Dmetri Kakmi's memoir Mother Land and Robert Gray's memoir The Land I Came Through Last.
Since March 2005, HEAT magazine and the Giramondo imprint have been published from the The Writing and Society Research Group at the University of Western Sydney. Our publishing activities are part of the Writing and Society Research Group, which brings together writers, publishers, scholars and students concerned with the social and imaginative power of good writing.
The Giramondo Publishing Company enjoys support from the Literature Fund of the Australia Council, the NSW Ministry of the Arts, Sydney Grammar School and Arts Victoria. All our books are designed by the award-winning Australian designer Harry Williamson.