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SUSAN AUSTIN grew up in Maryborough, Queensland, and has been writing poetry since the age of eight. She has published poetry in the University of Queensland publications Semper and Heretical as well as The Fraser Coast Chronical and Green Left Weekly, for whom she also writes news and social issues articles. She studied Irish and American poetry in Dublin last year and has recently settled in Hobart, where she works as an occupational therapist and is active in the movements for social change.

JENNY BARNARD is a member of Watersmeet. She is looking forward to the forthcoming anthology, Weave of Light, featuring the group’s haiku. Her work has frequently appeared in Famous Reporter.

ROBERT JAMES BERRY has been published in the US, UK, New Zealand, Australia, Greece and Canada. His first poetry collection, Smoke, appeared in 2000, his second - Stone (Ginninderra Press) - in November 2004. He lives in Auckland.

TONY BEYER's most recent books are Electric Yachts (2003) and Isthmus (2004), both from Puriri Press in Auckland. He is editing Poetry Aotearoa: new poetry from New Zealand biannually for Rob Riel's Picaro Press.

KEVIN BONHAM is a political stirrer/analyst/satirist who also holds a Ph.D in land snail biogeography, and works mainly as an invertebrate ecologist. He edited Togatus in 2002-3 and regularly trolls tasmaniantimes. His other interests include chess, the goth subculture and its music, internet forums and election scrutineering. His more detailed discussion of the Greens’ performance can be found at: http://home.iprimus.com.au/ltuffin/bonhamgreen.HTML.

PETER BOYLE has published four collections of poetry – Museum of Space (UQP, 2004), Coming Home from the World (UQP, 1994) which was a joint winner of the 1994 Banjo Award for Poetry and the 1995 NSW Premier’s Prize; The Blue Cloud of Crying (Hale & Iremonger, 1997) which won the 1997 Banjo Award for Poetry and the 1998 SA Premier’s Prize; What the Painter saw in our Faces (Five Islands Press, 2001).

MARGARET BRADSTOCK is a Sydney poet, editor and critic. She is an Honorary Visiting Fellow at the University of NSW, a long-term committee member of Poets Union and co-editor of Five Bells. She has published three collections of poetry, the most recent of which, The Pomelo Tree (Ginninderra, 2001), won the Wesley Michel Wright Prize for Poetry.

ANDREW BURKE is a poet and a writer with decades of publishing behind him. He has published a number of books of poetry, but the next one is always going to be 'the best'. At present Andrew is writing a novel, its tentative title being 'High Spirits'.

JILL CARTWRIGHT is a poet and artist and besotted grandmother who lives in Hobart. She is a member of Senior Momentum textile artists, prize-winners at the ‘Material Girl’ competitions, 2002 and 2004.

ANNE COLLINS writes poetry and fiction, essays and reviews. She lives in Hobart.

BILL COTTER writes poetry and fiction. He lives in Bairnsdale, Victoria.

KATE DELLER-EVANS lives in Adelaide's Mitcham Hills with her husband and five children. Her part-time work as a lecturer in English and professional writing at Flinders University and Adelaide TAFE is in addition to her creative writing doctoral studies. Her published collections are Travelling with Bligh (New Poets 7, Wakefield Press 2002) and (Bookends, 2003). She co-edited Another Universe: Friendly Street 28 (Wakefield Press) which was launched at the 2004 Writers' Week.

ADRIENNE EBERHARD was born in Dover, Tasmania, in 1964. Her poems and short stories have been published in a wide range of Australian journals including Southerly, Island, Westerly, Voices, Meanjin, Siglo and The Australian. Adrienne's first collection of poems, Agamemnon's Poppies (Black Pepper Press, 2003) was awarded equal 2nd in the 2003/2004 Anne Elder award. Her most recent collection is Jane, Lady Franklin (Black Pepper Press, 2004).

STEPHEN EDGAR is the author of several collections of poetry: Queuing for the Mudd Club, Ancient Music, Corrupted Treasures and Where the Trees Were. His most recent collection is Lost in The Foreground (Duffy and Snellgrove, 2003).

MICHAEL DE VALLE lives in Narre Warren with Lynette, their son Jack and two dogs. His poems have appeared in Quadrant, Going Down Swinging, Fly, Pendulum, The Mozzie and Woorilla.

ADRIAN FLAVELL’s most recent acceptances have come from LiNQ, Social Alternatives, The Canberra Times, Takuhe (N.Z.), Tamba and The Weekend Australian.

LORIN FORD is a Melbourne poet whose work has appeared in publications such as Blue Dog, Going Down Swinging, Salt-lick Quarterly, Poetrix, Pelt and mod-piece.

MARTIN FRENCH is a former editor of ars poetica and former secretary of the Melbourne Poets' Union. He holds a PhD in English from La Trobe University and is currently working on a new book: Coming to Japan. His work has previously appeared in Australian Short Stories, Overland, Cordite, Divan, Verandah and LiNQ amongst others.

JOSEPHINE FRY is generally content to dabble in recording her songs, editing her musical 'Grave Matter', getting on with her very long term novel and sending out stories including gags for Mad Magazine. She lives in Hobart.

GAIL GALLOWAY writes poetry and fiction. She lives in Tenterfield in New South Wales.

HELEN GEE is Councillor with the Australian Conservation Foundation, Convenor of the South East Forest Protection Group (Tasmania) and the Lake Pedder Restoration Committee (Australia). Editor of the book: For the Forests, A History of Tasmanian Forest Campaigns (TWS, 2001) and River of Verse, a Tasmanian Journey 1800 - 2004 (Back River Press, 2004).

JANE GIBIAN’S first poetry collection, The Body’s Navigation, was published by Five Islands Press in 1998. In 2002 she was an AsiaLink Literature Resident in Hanoi, Vietnam.

PETER GRANT lives in Tasmania. His first book, Habitat Garden (ABC Books), was launched at Watermark Festival. A particular interest in nature and literature took Peter to Ireland, Scotland, England and the USA in 2000 to research the roots of nature writing. His coordination of the new WildCare Tasmania Nature Writing Prize is one result. Articles, essays and reviews on nature, faith, history and music have appeared in various national and international publications and on the Web.

PHILIP HAMMIAL's most recent collection is In the Year of Our Lord Slaughter's Children (Island Press Co-operative).

KRISTIN HANNAFORD is a Queensland poet. Swelter (Interactive Press 2003) includes Kristin's first collection of poetry titled 'Inhale'. Her new media poem 'Grasslands' won the 2004 Leichhardt New Media Poetry prize, and Kristin's work has been published in many national magazines and anthologies - most recently papertiger and foam:e. Kristin is the guest poetry editor for Idiom 23 in 2005. She lives in Yeppoon in Central Queensland, with her partner and two sons. www.kristinhannaford.com

TODD HARDY is a Sydney poet whose most recent work has been publshed in LiNQ, Small Packages, Hermes and Micropress Oz.

JEFFREY HARPENG had a collection of his haiku and other poems Interruption of Dreams published by Sudden Valley Press (Christchurch) last year. A selection of haiku feature in A New Resonance 3 from Red Moon. A co-founder of the Small White Teapot Haiku Group (Christchurch), he now lives, body but not soul, in Brisbane.

RORY HARRIS is a poet and teacher. His poetry collections include Over the Outrow, From the Residence, Snapshots from a Moving Train, 16 Poems, Uncle Jack and Other Poems, Waterline and breeze.

PHILIP HARVEY is a Melbourne poet.

GRAEME HETHERINGTON’s most recent collections are Life Given (Ginnindera Press) and A Tasmanian Paraduse Lost (Walleah Press).

MARY JENKINS convenes poetry readings and workshops at Women Tasmania with Liz Winfield, and is writing fiction after years of concentrating on non-fiction.

PETER JERRIM wrote 5,000 pages of a hyperfiction for kids but gave up when he realised he was only one eighth of the way through. Now he reads stories to his grandkids, develops web-based businesses and writes poems.

MARTIN R. JOHNSON has published three books of poetry: After the Axe-Men (Penguin), The Clothes-prop Man (Wakefield Press), and Home Town Burial (Cornford Press). A new collection, the earth tree, is due from Five Islands Press.

KRISTEN LANG is a Tasmanian poet.

CHRISTOPHER KELEN is the winner of a number of Australian and international awards, his first book, The Naming of the Harbour and the Trees, received the Anne Elder Award in 1993. In 1996 he was Writer-in- Residence at the B.R. Whiting Library in Rome.

LIZ KIRBY writes poetry and essays. She lives in the U.K.

CHRISTINA KIRKPATRICK enjoys writing poetry and haiku. She lives in Hobart.

KAREN KNIGHT's poetry has been widely published in Australian anthologies, newspapers and literary journals, including Poetry Australia, Verandah, Sidewalk, LiNQ and Mattoid. She has also been published in U.K., U.S.A. Germany and Japan. With Sue Moss, Karen is the Co-Editor of Interior Despots - Running the Border, an anthology of women poets released by Pardalote Press in 2001. Her collections include Singing in the Grain (Walleah Press, 2001) and My Mother Has Become (Picaro Press, 2003). Karen's most recent collection is Under the One Granite Roof (Pardalote Press, 2004). [Note: One of the three poems from Karen's Tarkine Suite presented here - 'Thundershower' - has also been accepted for publication by 4W magazine.]

ZOLTAN KOVACS is a Hungarian born Australian poet who came to Australia in 1972 from communist Hungary. Along with a recent volume of poetry called Haymaking, he has been published in various magazines in Australia, U.S.A. and England.

SUSAN KRUSS' first book of poetry, The Meaning of Wood, was published by Five Islands Press in April 2003. She began writing in 1991 and her poems have been published in literary magazines and anthologies in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. She has worked as a secondary teacher, taxi driver, journalist, sub-editor, senior editor, and is currently a full-time instructional designer at Deakin University.

RAY LIVERSIDGE's first collection of poems, Obeying the Call, was published by Ginninderra Press in March 2003. The four poems appearing in this issue of famous reporter are from a manuscript Ray is currently working on entitled The Barrier Range, drawing on the exploits of the explorers Charles Sturt, and Burke and Wills.

MYRON LYSENKO has become obsessed with haiku over the past two years. His first haiku book, A rosebush grabs my sleeve, will be published by Flat Chat Press in 2005. Myron's haiku have been published in The Heron's Nest, frog pond, Simply Haiku, paper wasp, Salt Lick, etc. He is a winner of the Suruga Baika Haiku Award 2004.

PETER MACROW is a writer and editor who lives in Hobart. His published works includes haiku and longer poems, book reviews and fiction, and have appeared in Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Canada, Scotland, England, Belgium and Bulgaria. He is the editor of the 40-page chapbook poetry anthologies rePUBlic readings 8 & 9

SHANE McCAULEY was born in England in 1954, but has lived in Perth for most of his life. He has had four books of poetry published, the last being Shadow Behind the Heart (1996). He is employed as a TAFE lecturer in Adult Literacy.

ALLEN McGILL. Originally from NYC, Allen lives, writes, acts and directs theatre in Mexico. His published fiction, non-fiction, poetry, plays, photos, etc., have appeared in print as well as on line: NY Times, The Writer, Newsday, Lit Pot, Flashquake, Poetry Midwest, Poetic Voices, Herons Nest, Frogpond, Modern Haiku, World Haiku Review, and many others. He is haibun editor for Simply Haiku.

SUE MILL is a Queensland writer whose haiku regularly appears in famous reporter.

RON MOSS is an artist and poet and lives in Leslie Vale, Tasmania. He writes Japanese forms of poetry in English and is published across the world in various media. Websites www.ronmoss.com www.imperfections.info

MARK O’FLYNN's second collection of poetry, The Good Oil, was published by Five Islands Press. Born in Melbourne, he now lives in the Blue Mountains of New South Wales.

SHEILA O’MALLEY grew up in Rhode Island. After graduating, she lived in Boston, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, and finally New York City. She’s been blogging since October, 2002.

ESTHER OTTAWAY's poems have been published in Meanjin, Southerly, Imago and The Australian and have been arranged as contemporary jazz works in collaboration with leading Tasmanian musicians. She is the recipient of a Varuna Fellowship for 2004/05, and during 2005 will work on a poetry collection through Arts Tasmania funding.

SHERYL PERSSON is a Sydney based educator and poet. Her poems have been published in various literary journals, e-zines and anthologies in Australia, New Zealand, England and the USA, including Poetrix, Quadrant, Blue Dog, Tamba, Hermes, Centoria and Social Alternatives.

SAXBY PRIDMORE is a widely published poet. He lives in Hobart.

PATRICIA PRIME is a teacher living in Auckland, New Zealand. She writes poetry, haiku, reviews and essays, and is co-editor of the New Zealand haiku magazine winterSPIN.

GRAHAM ROWLANDS is an Adelaide-based satirical poet. Despite his seven collections, he prefers to publish widely in magazines and newspapers. He was awarded the Barbara Hanrahan Fellowship (2002).

BRENDAN RYAN lives in Portarlington. Why I Am Not a Farmer was published by Five Islands Press in 2000. He has had poems and essays published in a number of journals including Island, Heat and The Age.

CHRISTOPHER SHEIL is a writer living in Sydney. A contributing columnist for the Australian Financial Review, his writing has also been published by the Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, The Australian, Dissent, the Australian Journal of Public Administration, Southern Review, Labour History, Utilities Policy, the journal of Urban Policy and Research, and the Journal of Industrial Relations. His books have been published by Allen & Unwin, Pluto Press and UNSW Press. [Permission kindly granted to use this contribution from Christopher Sheil's blog, which is still available for perusal on the net at http://backpagesblog.com/weblog/ ]

CARLA SARI lives in North Carlton, Victoria. She's worked at various jobs both in Italy and Australia. For the past 12 years she has dedicated herself to writing short fiction and poetry.

SHEN's first poetry collection, City of My Skin (Five Islands Press) was launched in 2001. He lives in Adelaide.

ANDREA SHERWOOD’s first poetry collection, One Siren or Another (UQP), was second in the Anne Elder Award. Her poetry has been published in most of Australia’s literary magazines. She is a member of Myron Lysenko’s ‘Soup and Haiku’ group.

SUE STANFORD began writing haiku about eleven years ago when she was living in Japan. Her first published haiku appeared in Famous Reporter, but since then others have been published in various journals, anthologies and ezines. Sue now lives in Melbourne with her family.

ADAM STOKELL is thirty-one, works with the disabled and lives in North Hobart.

JACKIE SWIFT has had a variety of pieces – poetry, articles, short stories, essays – published in a range of publications including The Weekend Australian, Northern Perspective, Mattoid, Cordite, Island, online and on ABC Radio. "I have two completed novels, that haven’t quite hit the right publishing buttons just yet and a new one in the works…."

SUE SZILVASSY is a Tasmanian writer.

PHILOMENA VAN RIJSWIJK’S poetry can be found in literary journals including Island and Hecate, and the anthologies Moorilla Mosaic and Interior Despots. Philomena’s most recent novel, The World As A Clockface, was published by Penguin in 2001.

RALPH WESSMAN publishes famous reporter with support from Arts Tasmania.

JOHN WEST works full time as a nurse in a large rehabilitation hospital in Melbourne and writes many poems about people he meets there although his family is an even more important source of material. He is currently convenor of the Fellowship of Australian Writers Molly Bloom's Poetry readings at Molly Bloom's Hotel in Port Melbourne.

LIZ WINFIELD instigated the weekly Republic Readings in 1999, coordinated them for four years and edited the associated RePUBlic Readings chapbook series published by Walleah Press. She is a poetry editor for Famous Reporter and is young persons' liaison officer for the Fellowship of Australian Writers' (FAW) Tasmanian branch.

DAVID YOUNG is a keen observer of Australian political life. He lives in Hobart.