Warmest congratulations to Melbourne City of Literature’s award-winning writer and essayist Shu-Ling Chua 蔡淑羚

The writers residency, organised by the Caselberg Trust and Dunedin UNESCO City of Literature, was launched on 3 March 2023 to mark International Writers’ Day. It will be offered every second year to writers from the other 41 UNESCO Cities of Literature, and solely to applicants from Ōtepoti Dunedin and across Aotearoa every other year. 

The judges were delighted by the quality of the 42 applications received from candidates in 22 Cities of Literature across the world and were very impressed by the high standard of all the applications. Shu-Ling’s work stood out for them in a talented field and her success means she will reside and write in the Caselberg House, in Broad Bay, on Dunedin’s Otago Peninsula, for six weeks from October to mid-November 2023. 

Having the space to focus on her extremely interesting essay collection in the beautiful Caselberg House will no doubt make for an enriching Residency for Shu-Ling, and enriching for our City of Literature too, we can’t wait to welcome Shu-Ling and introduce her to our wonderful Ōtepoti writing community.

A note from Shu-Ling: “I'm thrilled and looking forward to meeting other writers and readers in Dunedin in October. I'm sure my time at the Caselberg House will be beautifully inspiring. I’m grateful to the late Margaret Egan, the Caselberg Trust and Dunedin UNESCO City of Literature for their generosity.”

While her current preferred form is lyric essays, she has also written nonfiction, criticism, poetry and fiction for various publications, including Peril Magazine, Meanjin, Going Down Swinging, Asian American Writers’ Workshop, Vogue China and 4A Papers.

Her essay collection, Echoes, explores nostalgia, inheritance and small joys. It jointly won the 2021 Small Press Network Book of the Year Award. Other recent achievements include being shortlisted for the 2021 Deakin University Nonfiction Prize and 2018 Woollahra Digital Literary Award.

Shu-Ling has presented and performed at a range of festivals, and was a board member of Peril Magazine, producer of Noted Writers Festival and Voiceworks nonfiction editor.

During the residency, she will work on a full-length essay collection on “art, intimacy, longing, and the blurry boundaries between private and public”.

We’re thrilled to welcome Shu-Ling Chua as our first recipient.

The Caselberg Trust is a Charitable Trust formed in 2006 to purchase the home of the late Anna and John Caselberg, to use it to host creative residencies of national and international standing, and to support and facilitate creative projects. John Caselberg was Burns Fellow at the University of Otago in 1961 and his writing included poetry, criticism, play writing, short stories, and essays. He is best known as a long-time friend of and collaborator with prominent Aotearoa New Zealand artist, Colin McCahon. Anna Caselberg was a significant Aotearoa New Zealand painter, and daughter of Sir Tosswill Woollaston.

Margaret Egan (1949-2020) was born in the UK and lived in Germany for many years, before retiring home to Sheffield in 2014. She worked as an educator, a linguist and a traveller, but was passionate about all things creative – from the visual arts to literature, poetry and photography. She visited New Zealand on numerous occasions and was a good friend to the Caselberg Trust. Following her death in 2020, the Trust received notification Margaret had left a bequest to the Caselberg Trust, leading to the establishment of the Residency in her name.