Upcoming events

Shari is open to invitations to read or speak at festivals, poetry events and panel discussions, where she shares her work and reflects on language, creativity and process.

Her presence is thoughtful, grounded and generous. Discerning with her time, Shari is curious and committed to building sustainable creativity in community.

If you’d like to invite Shari to read at your next event, or curate a connection or workshop, please feel welcome to get in touch.

Community Events, Launches & Readings

Peripheries
May
1

Peripheries

Peripheries Journal: A Journal of Word, Image, and Sound is celebrating the release of Volume 7.

Centre for the Study of World Religions, Harvard Divinity School, Harvard.

Join us for the launch of Peripheries, Volume 7: an evening of word, image, and sound, as we explore poetry’s interior spaces and the memories that haunt it. Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Carl Phillips will launch the edition alongside Amanda Gunn, author of Things I Didn’t Do with This Body and editor of Peripheries. Alinh Dolinh and Alan Yan, recipients of the inaugural Peripheries Poetry Prize, will also read their winning poems.

After the readings, guests are invited to “step inside” the journal, featuring poems, paintings, and multimedia content—offering a fuller experience of the voices and visions in this edition. There will also be live music and light refreshments.

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PoetiCas at The Coolroom ft. Shari Kocher
May
25

PoetiCas at The Coolroom ft. Shari Kocher

PoetiCas has been hosting regular poetry gatherings in Castlemaine since 2015, following on the tradition of Ross Donlon's poetry readings in the decade prior. It has grown into a wonderful community and their monthly events are beloved by many. Lockdowns and uncertainty put their activities on pause for much of 2020 and 2021, and they are now thrilled to announce a new chapter at a fine new venue.

The usual format brings a featured reader to share their work, as well as an open section for the community to share their own original poems in a warm and supportive space, lovingly MC'd by local poet and publisher Tegan Gigante. All are welcome to attend, to read or just to listen.

Feature Poet for MAY:
Shari Kocher is an Australian poet, fiction-writer, researcher and therapist, currently taking time out for re-orientation and development. She is the author of Foxstruck and Other Collisions (Puncher & Wattmann, 2021) which was Highly Commended for the NSW Premier’s Literature Awards (Kenneth Slessor Poetry Prize 2022), and The Non-Sequitur of Snow (Puncher & Wattmann 2015), which was Highly Commended in the 2015 Anne Elder Awards (Australia).

Widely published and anthologized in Australia and elsewhere, including in Best Australian Poems 2021, 2016, 2013, Kocher’s work has won or been shortlisted for numerous awards, including the Peter Steele Poetry Award in 2019.

She holds a PhD from Melbourne University, is of Irish settler descent mixed with unknown heritage, and lives as a guest on the unceded lands of the Dja Dja Wurrung peoples, where she pays her respects to Elders past and present.

https://www.sharikocher.com

2pm for a 2.30 start
4th Saturday of every month
in The Coolroom at the Northern Arts Hotel
359 Barker St, Castlemaine
Open section as usual,
limited to 3 minutes per reader.
All Welcome!
$5 donation at the door much appreciated.

So buy a drink from the bar and join us at The Coolroom at the Northern Arts Hotel, the new home for PoetiCas.
Contact Tegan: poeticaspoeticas@outlook.com

COST: $5 donation at door appreciated

Source: https://www.facebook.com/events/319396544463478

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Melbourne Multivocal Reading
Sept
1

Melbourne Multivocal Reading

Melbourne Multivocal Reading Event with Bella Li, Bonny Cassidy, Joan Fleming, Erin Scudder, Shari Kocher and Amy Brown as MC.

Live Celebration of Foxstruck and Other Collisions

Location: Brunswick Bounds Bookshop

Details TBA

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Blue Knot Foundation Award
Aug
15

Blue Knot Foundation Award

Congratulations, Shari Kocher, winner of the Blue Knot Foundation Award for the poem ‘Signs’.

From Shari:

Many thanks to the Blue Knot Foundation for sponsoring this award. All supporters of poets and poetry right now, of feeling deeply and of writing finely, are of inestimable value to the futures of us all, and the world we are responsible for creating together. Very grateful for this unexpected prize, and those who dedicate time and effort each year to put together an inclusive anthology that celebrates what it is to be human, and to heal, as much as to witness the contours and particularities of suffering. Thankyou Blue Knot Foundation for the work you do.

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Kate van der Drift’s latest exhibition, Sweet and Sour
Apr
20
to 16 May

Kate van der Drift’s latest exhibition, Sweet and Sour

Book cover art by Kate van der Drift for Foxstruck and Other Collisions, which is showcased.

Excerpt from ArtNow:

Currently, Sweet and Sour sees the artist capture the physical makeup of the land and water burying unexposed film negatives into the Piako River for a period of four weeks. Over this time, the algae, bacteria, pollution and sediment in the water reacted with the film, producing clouds of vivid alchemical reactions. The end result is a camera-less image; abstract and expansive, brilliantly coloured photographs emulating celestial bodies and the beyond.

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Book Launch at the Lass O'Gowrie
Nov
28

Book Launch at the Lass O'Gowrie

Puncher & Wattman

Launching Foxstruck and Other Collisions in Newcastle, 28 November, with a total of five authors: Ed Wright, Chris Brown, Ivy Ireland, Kerry Shying and Shari Kocher.

Details to be confirmed. Register your interest by sending you details to Shari to keep you informed of the final details closer to the date.

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