What’s Your Deal?

Emily White is a writer and performer from Boorloo/Perth, living in Naarm/Melbourne. Motivated by conflicting desires to make people laugh and make people horny, their work primarily straddles the realms of comedy and erotica. They are also interested in the Australian Gothic and what this genre can offer queer stories. Emily has previously won the Rachel Funari prize for fiction and is the creator of Sap – a queer erotica zine. They make zines, write stories, and perform in their queer comedy coven, The Titwitchez.

Aurelia St Clair is a Naarm-based comedian, writer, podcaster and content creator. You might have seen them on your TikTok FYP, your local Savers or on stage at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. Aurelia received a fellowship at the Wheeler Centre in 2021 and won a silver award in the 2022 Australian Podcast Awards as a co-host of PopGays.

Cassandra is an award-winning Cypriot-Australian writer. Her play Hush Hush was a finalist for the New Play Award and longlisted for Theatre 503’s International Award. She’s a winner of the Ultimo Prize, and published in Everything, All At Once by Ultimo Press. She was commissioned for Paines Plough Theatre’s Come To Where I Am: Australia. Her latest work, The 13th Month, premiered at Flight Path Theatre in Sydney this year to critical acclaim. Other staged works: The Marvellous Life of Carlo Gatti, Loose Teeth (shortlisted for Max Afford Award 2016), The Last Journalist on Earth, Limerence, 44 Degrees, Like Breathing.

Kirk Marshall is a Brisbane-born writer, teacher, fundraiser, and hellraiser living in Melbourne, Australia. He has written for more than eighty publications, both in Australia and overseas, including “Award-Winning Australian Writing”, “Island”, “Wet Ink”, “Going Down Swinging”, “Voiceworks”, “Verandah”, “visible ink”, “fourW”, and “The Grapple Annual”. Most recently, a chapter from his hillbilly apocalypse novel secured a nomination for The Pushcart Prize. Kirk’s date with fame and defamation arose when he authored the “Stranger Things” / “Round the Twist” mashup meme in 2016, before it was subsequently cannibalised by Netflix. He writes for dollars and dinosaurs at Museums Victoria.

Emily Dale has just finished a BA in Creative Writing at RMIT and is a copywriter and editor at Small Fish Business Coaching. At this period in her life, she resides in the ever-changing, expressive city of Melbourne/Naarm. She spends a lot of her time when not writing, exploring the city and the expansive land beyond on her trusty (rusty?) Yamaha SR, Percy.