A three-years-in-the-writing deeply personal ode to the vast red dirt of the Outback has won Australia's most prestigious poetry competition – The 2024 Cloncurry Poetry Prize (The Prize).
Melbourne-based Imogen Batt-Doyle has won The Prize against hundreds of entries with her poem Larapinta (Red Dirt Dreaming) which embraced this year's theme, 'Standing on the Shoulders of Giants', by reflecting on the Dreamtime, the spirits that roam the Outback and her personal connections to the land.
Though Ms Batt-Doyle could not be present for the award ceremony, she was thrilled to learn she was the winner and receive $10,000 in prize money.*
An outdoor educator, Imogen has spent the past three years writing the poem, drafting, adding and editing while she was guiding groups of adults along the Larapinta Trail (which she has walked 42 times), west of Alice Springs. The trail ends at Rwetjepme (Mount Sonder). There is an 8km climb to the 1500m peak, which she would walk pre-dawn to watch the sunrise with her groups.
She channels her love of wild spaces through poetry and believes that the wild still runs through us – and our cities. Her full bio is below.
"I had the unique experience of hiking predominantly with fundraising groups, who were raising money for conditions like Breast Cancer, MS, PTSD and Parkinson's Disease. This meant those on my tours were often adults who had faced close and often painful encounters with adversity, sickness and death. Witnessing strangers come together in their grief and in their determination was powerful. I would share the poem Larapinta with these groups at the end of the experience, as we sat in the gorge and reflected for one final time together," said Ms Batt-Doyle.
The winner was announced by Cloncurry Shire Council Mayor Greg Campbell on the banks of Chinaman Creek Dam at Cloncurry, with poet enthusiasts and locals gathering to celebrate.
Mayor Campbell said Australia's cultural signature, and particularly that in the Outback, was inked by the muses of poets.
"There are few that don't recognise the names Dorothea Mackellar, Banjo Paterson, Henry Lawson, Oodgeroo Noonuccal and even famed modern poet, Rupert McCall, and their spine-tingling odes to Australia's 'sweeping plains, ragged mountain ranges, droughts and flooding rains', it's fitting therefore, that one of the nation's richest poetry competitions is hosted by one of the nation's most beautiful Outback towns – Cloncurry," he said.
"The number and calibre of this year's entries have reinforced The Prize as one of the richest and most prestigious poetry contests in the country."
The Mayor also commended the work of this year's judges; Allan Cooney, Brenda-Joy Pritchard (2022 Prize Winner) and Penny Lane (2023 Prize Winner).
Our judges have volunteered many hours to read hundreds of poems entered in this year's competition and we are so thankful. It's vital to have a judging panel as experienced and expert as these three."
Ms Pritchard, who said she was honoured to be back judging the competition again this year, added, "The Cloncurry Poetry Prize carries a great deal of prestige and as an 'open' style competition, attracts poets of all genres from around Australia."
"This year's theme generated responses and tributes to 'giants' from all areas of the Outback and from all eras of the past. It was wonderful to see so many varied expressions showing how the character, customs and literature of Outback people have been formed and shaped by the Dreamtime legends, the Indigenous Australian custodians, explorers, inventors and entrepreneurs, and by settlers and visitors from all parts of the world," she said.
The winning poems can be found on Cloncurry Shire Council's website.
