For this writer, inspiration struck in the unlikeliest of places

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For this writer, inspiration struck in the unlikeliest of places

By Helen Pitt

In a bid to overcome writer’s block, award-winning author Ellen van Neerven started swimming every day.

So it was quite by accident that the playwright, who is of Dutch and Aboriginal origins, from Queensland’s Mununjali clan, created their first play, Swim, from doing daily laps at the local pool.

Actor Dani Sibosado, who will be performing in the upcoming Griffin Theatre production of Swim.

Actor Dani Sibosado, who will be performing in the upcoming Griffin Theatre production of Swim.Credit: Louise Kennerley

“I find swimming is a really good way to put your mind into a completely different zone and just flow,” says van Neerven, whose debut work of fiction Heat and Light won the 2015 Sydney Morning Herald Best Young Australian Novelist award and was a 2016 co-winner of the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards’ Indigenous Writer’s Prize.

“Water is so much a part of the social fabric of Australia, particularly Queensland. Where I grew up in suburban Brisbane, the important question as a kid was ‘do you have a pool?’“, they said.

“I wanted to amp up the metaphor of fluidity, how the lead character accesses both their masculine and feminine parts just like water, which is fluid and has no boundaries,” says van Neerven, who identifies as non-binary.

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The story revolves around gender-fluid protagonist E, negotiating the space between the men’s and women’s changing rooms. The lead is played by non-binary Baad and Yawuru performer Dani Sibosado.

Swim, which opens on July 10 at Carriageworks, began as a series of poems but developed into a theatre piece working with Griffin Theatre’s Associate Artistic Director Andrea James.

34-year-old van Neerven were inspired by African-American Ntozake Shange’s For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow Is Enuf , a series of monologues accompanied by dance and music.

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“There are not many works of drama that explain the non-binary and transgender experience. This play is in its own lane and I hope it will inspire others, and other works,” van Neerven said.

Sibosado, 30, who played in Bran Nu Dae and grew up around Broome, took time out from studying music/sound design and gender studies at the University of Western Australia to take on this role.

Ellen van Neerven: ‘Water is so much a part of the social fabric of Australia’.

Ellen van Neerven: ‘Water is so much a part of the social fabric of Australia’.Credit: Chris Hopkins

“I am a non-binary and saltwater person so when I was pitched the idea to play this character it was really exciting,” said Sibosado, whose favourite swimming spot is the Dampier Peninsula on the Kimberley coast. It was the thing they pined for while studying in Melbourne.

“The thing I really missed was the beach, part of the play’s message is about the healing nature of water.

“In some scenes, E navigates the change room space, where there are a few judgy looks. It’s unclear why if it is because they are black, non-binary or queer. That is a very familiar feeling,” Sibosado said.

“This is a play of firsts, the first play by Ellen, the first play I’ve performed in and the first play with a non-binary lead, played by a non-binary character written by a non-binary playwright. I hope it starts a conversation, because it is giving words to articulate the non-binary experience.”

Swim is on at Carriageworks from July 10

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