The recipients of Adelaide’s Parkestone Association 2014 grants for community projects are the Pride March Adelaide Committee and Adelaide writer Mag Merrilees.
In announcing the grants, Parkestone Public Officer Ian Purcell AM said, “The trustees are pleased to fund the Pride March Adelaide Committee to have two new Pride March banners made. This small committee headed by Margie Fischer and Eric Kuhlman have done a sterling job over many years organising the March. As a founding member of the committee I know how much work is involved. It’s because of the dedication of a few community members that the March happens every year as the opening event of Feast. The committee relies upon the financial and in-kind support of individuals and other community organisations. They deserve all the support they can get.”
Parkestone is also supporting the publication of Unleashed, an illustrated novel by Margaret (Mag) Merrilees, which will be launched during Feast in November. Purcell told blaze, “Mag is very deserving. She’s an active and enthusiastic community member. I’ve worked with her on various Feast committees. Mag won the SA Festival Award for an Unpublished Manuscript at Adelaide Writers’ Week in 2012 with her novel The First Week, which was published by Wakefield Press in 2013.
“Unleashed is based on Mag’s on-line serial Adelaide Days of which I must admit I am an avid follower. There are few published fictional works set in Adelaide with characters to whom our community can relate. Unleashed is a light-hearted tale of two lesbian grannies, their friends, family, community, and world. Mag uses humour to show the everyday humanity of people in our world, especially in the lives of ageing lesbians and their friends.
“Coincidentally, one chapter begins: ‘It is Saturday afternoon and the LGBTQI community and friends gather in Victoria Square for the annual Pride March. Victoria is loving it, walking round hand-in-hand with her grandmother and their friend Uncle Steven, aka Didgy Tarlis. Didgy is a magician and sometimes he wears a tuxedo, but today he is in full drag, sequins, feathers, eyelashes. Victoria admires this enormously …’ I encourage everyone to buy a copy of Unleashed in November to support Mag and Wakefield Press in this venture.”
The original story can be found here.
