Lisa Gorton
Lisa Gorton (born 1972) is an Australian poet, novelist, literary editor and essayist. She is the author of three award-winning poetry collections: "Press Release", "Hotel Hyperion" "," and "Empirical". Her novel "The Life of Houses," received the NSW Premier’s People’s Choice Award for Fiction, and the Prime Minister’s Award for Fiction (shared). Gorton is also the editor of Black Inc’s anthology "Best Australian Poems 2013". Gorton’s poetry has been widely anthologised, including in "The Turnrow Anthology of Contemporary Australian Poetry", edited by John Kinsella, the "Best Australian Poems" series (2008, 2009, 2010, 2011 , 2012, 2014, 2015), "Contemporary Australian Feminist Poetry," edited by Bonny Cassidy and Jessica Wilkinson, the "Anthology of Australian Prose Poetry", " "edited b"y" Cassandra Atherton and Paul Hetherington, the "Poetry Magazine" May 2016 selection of Australian poetry, edited by Bob Adamson with photos by Juno Gemes, and online anthologies "Poetry International" and "lyrikline". Lisa’s poetry can also be found online at ‘Cordite’ magazine. Gorton’s essays have been published in the "Sydney Review of Books" "and Australian Book Review", and in the essay collection "Australian Face", edited by James Ley and Catriona Menzies-Pike. Gorton wrote the introductory essay for  the Text Classics reissue of Christina Stead’s novel "The Little Hotel". Lisa also wrote the catalogue essay for Izabela Pluta’s artwork "Apparent Distance" in the 2019 exhibition"The National" at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. Gorton is interested in ekphrastic poetry. She has composed a series of poems for Izabela Pluta’s artist’s book "Figures of Slippage and Oscillation." Lisa has also written ekphrastic poems for the catalogue of the 2010 Adelaide Biennial of Contemporary Art "Before and After Science", for the exhibition "Conversations in Ellipsis", and for the "Melbourne Now" limited edition volume from the  National Gallery of Victoria. Lisa gave a poetry reading at TEDx Sydney. Education. Gorton was educated at the University of Melbourne and at Oxford University. At Oxford, as a Rhodes Scholar, Gorton completed an MPhil in Renaissance Literature and a DPhil on John Donne. She received the John Donne Society Award for Outstanding Publication in Donne Studies. Career. In 1994 she was awarded the inaugural Vincent Buckley Poetry Prize. Having previously worked as poetry editor for the literary journal, Gorton was the Australian Book Review's Poet of the Month in October 2019. Gorton has contributed essays to the Australian  Book Review and the Sydney Review of Books. As of 2021, she is poetry editor of "Island". She is the granddaughter of the former Prime Minister John Gorton. Awards and recognition. Gorton’s awards for poetry include the Victorian Premier’s Prize for Poetry, the Vincent Buckley Poetry Prize, and the Philip Hodgins Memorial Medal. Her novel "The Life of Houses" was awarded the New South Wales Premier’s People’s Choice Award, and the Prime Minister’s Fiction Prize.   Lisa’s poetry books have also been shortlisted in the Prime Minister’s Prize for Poetry, the Mary Gilmore Poetry  Prize, the Melbourne Prize for Literature Best Writing Award, and the NSW Premier’s Poetry Award. Critical Response. On "Empirical" Jessica Wilkinson, poet and editor of "Rabbit" magazine, interviewed Gorton about her poetry collection "Empirical", noting Lisa’s interest in ‘how a feeling for place originates’. In "The Sydney Review of Books," poet and critic Michael Farrell suggests that Gorton’s poetry collection "Empirical" offers ‘models of 3D thought’, remarking that ‘Gorton reanimates - and translates - historical textual materials into contemporary poetry’, and that her work ‘performs as an antidote to nationalist ideology’. In "The Sydney Morning Herald," James Antoniou writes : ‘an important voice is breaking through here: assured, polyphonic and, for all its quietness, visionary’. On "The Life of Houses" In the "Sydney Review of Books", Kerryn Goldsworthy writes about Gorton’s debut novel "The Life of Houses": ‘One of the main reasons for Gorton’s status as a highly respected, prize-winning Australian poet is her unique and personal angle of vision on the world. It’s something that, as Auden surmises, cannot be taught…For Gorton it seems not so much a matter of finding "le mot juste" as of making something entirely new: not merely choosing  the word or naming the non-verbal thing it represents, but of using metaphor to create a new and separate third entity in which a word or phrase brings an inchoate, intangible feeling, sensation or memory out of the shadows and into the sunlight of consciousness’. Works. Poetry. Individual poems have been published in "Heat" magazine, "Poetry" magazine, "The Best Australian Poems 2008," "The" "Best Australian Poems 2009," "The" "Best Australian Poems 2010," "The Best Australian Poems 2012."