Writer loses fellowship award over Gaza tweet

Indigenous writer Karen Wyld has been stripped of a Creative Australia-funded $15,000 black&write! fellowship over comments she made on social media in October last year about the Gaza war.

Ms Wylde, who also writes under the name K A Ren Wyld, was told the award had been withdrawn hours before she was to be presented with it in Brisbane on Tuesday.

The State Library of Queensland has launched “an independent review of the suite of awards and fellowships we administer”.

The black&write! ceremony will be rescheduled for a later date.

Ms Wylde had been awarded the fellowship for her 110,000-word manuscript documenting seven generations of stolen Indigenous children.

The Australian newspaper said the grant had been withdrawn after Queensland Arts Minister Paul Langbroek and the Queensland premier, David Crisafulli, wrote to library chief executive Vicki McDonald and the library’s chair, Debbie Best, voicing concerns about social media posts made by Wyld.

A statement posted on the State Library’s website on Tuesday said the black&write! fellowships, “awarded solely on the literary merit of submitted manuscripts”, were designed to encourage and support First Nations writers in fiction and poetry genres and facilitate publication.

“Regrettably, media coverage and commentary today in relation to the personal views of the recommended recipient has overshadowed the intent of the awards,” the statement said.

“This has significantly impacted the individual artists and people involved.”