Hidden Nerve - Alice Pung on Creating Convincing Characters

CREATING CONVINCING CHARACTERS with Alice Pung

6pm Wednesday 7 October, via Zoom

For our final two sessions of 2026, MARION is opening our normally closed HIDDEN NERVE development program to the wider writing community.

A rare opportunity to step inside Hidden Nerve with Alice Pung. Join Alice for a special 90-minute online session, available as a one-off public booking.

MARION's year-long HIDDEN NERVE series offers writers the opportunity to learn from some of the most exciting Australian writers working today. Exploring the art and craft of prose, sessions range from word choice and the mechanics of sentences to creating compelling characters, building dramatic tension through gesture, and more. HIDDEN NERVE is usually reserved exclusively for its selected cohort, making this a rare opportunity to experience the program, and to support MARION and our work with writers.

Online | 90 minutes | Limited places

Alice Pung OAM is a Melbourne writer and teacher whose award-winning books include Unpolished Gem, Her Father’s Daughter, Laurinda, Close to Home, and One Hundred Days. She is the editor of the anthologies Growing Up Asian in Australia and My First Lesson, and the current Artist in Residence at Janet Clarke Hall, the University of Melbourne. In 2022 Alice was awarded an Order of Australia for her services to Literature. 

We’re delighted to welcome guest Beejay Silcox, who will facilitate the session, and lead an accompanying interview with Alice, to be published on the MARION Journal. Join this session to sharpen your skills at creating characters and put your questions to Alice.

Tickets

• General tickets

  $65

• MARION members

  $50