From 1969-1979 a famous Australian artist, Donald Friend, had a house in Bali where he had up to 20 Balinese ‘houseboys’ who stayed at his home. Donald Friend kept diaries detailing his pedophilia there with boys aged 9-12 years old. He finally bequeathed these diaries to the National Library on the condition they publish them. Read the rest of this entry »

A poem about my experience of my honors year at university. I almost quit due to the behavior of my supervisor but was told that as my appointments in his office were essential to passing that if I changed supervisors I’d risk failing my honors year. Read the rest of this entry »

Temple Grandin’s first book, Emergence: Labeled Autistic (by Temple Grandin in liason with her ghost writerMargaret Scariano), was published in 1986 by Arena Press which was a publisher of Academic and Therapy publications. Read the rest of this entry »

DONNA WILLIAMS:
I first met Kimberly when my second autobiography book came out, Somebody Somewhere. I was staying in a rented house in Connecticut and she was one of my readers who felt she may have been autistic. It was around 1994 and the diagnosis of Asperger’s was not yet happening. Kimberly stayed in touch over the years and heard about her diagnosis with Aspergers, watched her develop as an advocate and writer, watched her become a ghost writer and write her own autobiography which she’s just published. It was a rip your heart out book and I’d recommend it.
Hi Kimberly, welcome to the interview. Tell us about you. Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s my upcoming events so far…. Read the rest of this entry »

Three years ago I began an interactive poetry challenge on my blog.   It involved the public sending me 1-2 word titles and I had to send back a poem to each title within 48 hours.

Ranging from surreal, to grungy, from romantic, to funny, from political to symbolic and everywhere in between, the poems were as diverse as the titles sent in.   I gathered them into a collection called Weirdos Like Me.  It’s a collection of poetry, art and surrealism.  Amidst the poetry are also song lyrics to songs by Donna And The Aspinauts with whom I am the lead singer and main singer-songwriter. Read the rest of this entry »

This week, I released my new book, Weirdos Like Me. It’s a collection of art, poetry and surrealism.  And, so, dedicated to all of you living with snow up to your eyeballs, here’s one of the works from the book, entitled SNOW.

SNOW

Confetti soft, it fell, calling me, the girl from a land of sun.

From the window it took my heart.

My feet ran me down the stairs.

I turned, music box dancer in a world of falling sky

And I knew snow. Read the rest of this entry »

In childhood I was called Dolly Burger by my mother’s side, Miss Polly by my father.  I’d rather have been Miss Polly even if I was sick, sick, sick too often than be anyone’s doll.  I didn’t like doll’s, those staring, plastic almost demonic representations of a one-size-fits all normality or perfection.  I never identified with being Doll-y or anyone’s doll.  When my mother told me I was hers, her doll, I felt the foundations of my feminist rejection of conformist expectations of ‘what a girl should be’.  I liked the ballet dress with its fluttering leafy skirt, its sheeny pink sating and mother of pearl beading catching rainbows in the lights.  But the doll thing… Read the rest of this entry »

I first met Dr Danczak when I was working as an autism consultant in the UK.  When I saw kids who had physical symptoms I’d send them up to him and I was pleased to find most would end up in a healthier state and more switched on and together once their health issues were addressed.  Here’s our interview Read the rest of this entry »

We had an awesome Halloween night performing FOOTSTEPS OF A NOBODY at The Guild Theatre last night.  It was a good turnout, great ambiance and my heartfelt gratitude to all who contributed so much to the show – fellow producer, Harry Paternoster, of Walking Into Bars who co-produced the show with Aspinauts Players, Paul Spears who is both The Aspinauts drummer and technical manager doing the audio, arranging the stage, driving the trolley, Stuart Moore and Chris Samuel who are absolute gems and attended the shop and were the most wonderful ushers for the night, Anthony Julian who really rose to the occasion on the keyboards and provided us the seamless yet theatrical transitions from prose to song throughout the show, all the members of the band on the night for their musical and personal professionalism and being so damned fab to work with, the venues technition and supervisor who made it a great venue to work from, and to the wonderful audience who got so into the show, Rosemary Crossley, Chris Borthwick and Anne Mc Donald for the fab after show Halloween supper back in Brunswick.  THANK YOU.

Next, we take the show to Geelong West’s Woodbin Theatre on Jan 23rd 2010.

All future Aspinauts shows can be found at http://www.aspinauts.com

Warmly,
Donna Williams, Dip Ed, BA Hons.
Author, artist, singer-songwriter, screenwriter.
Autism consultant and public speaker.

http://www.myspace.com/nobodynowherethefilm
http://www.donnawilliams.net
http://www.aspinauts.com