Anna Borzi was an investment banker for the greater part of 20 years before she founded the First Nations Writers Festival (FNWF) in 2021. She’d always searched for books from the Greater Pacific and First Nations writers all over the world but came up short at finding anyone because these books didn’t exist. Borzi made it her mission to change that. Ahead of the fourth FNWF held in Townsville in May 2025, B&T sat down with Borzi to speak about the Festival and the importance of brands and individuals alike in celebrating Indigenous voices from Australia and beyond.
Borzi originally considered setting up an awards body that focused on Indigenous writers, but she quickly realised there weren’t enough books to award—Borzi needed to publish them herself. She turned her attention to a part-festival model and part-publishing firm that also gave awards for completed manuscripts.
The manuscripts go through a panel of judges consisting of Indigenous Elders to decide on award winners. Many consist of memoirs and fictional retellings of ancestral stories.
“The very first manuscript we got was from Solomon Islands, and they hadn’t published a novel in 40 years. That rang a bell in my head, and I just said, ‘This is what we have to do'”.
The First Nations Writers Festival is gaining traction in Australia and beyond, but Borzi noted that it was “still behind” where she would like it to be in the nation’s consciousness.
“There’s a great literary Indigenous festival in Melbourne called Blak and Bright. If they were Blak and Bright Pacific, they’d cover the whole thing, but that’s where we came in, to extend those voices throughout the Pacific and even the world”.
“People are reaching out from Mexico and Africa to send us manuscripts, so it’s not just Indigenous Australians but even wider than that,” Borzi added.
Oral vs. Written Storytelling Traditions
The First Nations peoples of Australia have a rich oral storytelling tradition that continues today. Before colonisation, there was no written tradition of telling stories. However, the ability to tell and sell stories in today’s world is dominated by bookselling.
The West’s overemphasis on written histories and stories means that oral storytelling traditions have been overshadowed. Recognising and celebrating Indigenous stories that have their roots in oral histories is, therefore, very important.
When Borzi was growing up in Papua New Guinea, she learnt the value of oral storytelling and witnessed just how rich these traditions are among communities. A North Queensland Elder once told her that “somebody else is writing and has written your story”.
“History is being written without you. Your children’s children will be reading this history over here when they should know the other one, too,” Borzi said.
“I always tell young writers to go to their Elders and ask them to tell you their stories and write it down. Send it to us! It doesn’t need to be perfect. We’re now onto our fourth or fifth generation of people from these ancient stories and we haven’t written them down, and they’re all dying. It’s critical that these stories are written down. The stories are what’s important, it doesn’t really matter what the medium is.
“English is the most common language in the world, whether we like it or not. It’s such a powerful tool for young people to pick up a book and learn more”.
“We are doing this because it raises people in the eyes of their community. When their community can see them on live TV and selling books, it is a huge achievement. We want them to be appreciated and for everyone to see that there’s value in having these books”.
A young writer at this year’s Festival is Mabel Gibson, whose book Crybaby uses the micro memoir form, which uses short snapshots or vignettes to create a story from disparate pieces.
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Marketing Strategies and Opportunities for Brands
The Festival has grown through an organic marketing strategy, or what Borzi likes to call “a nimble strategy”. That’s code for: they did it all themselves. But the Festival has managed to reach an impressive audience without hiring marketing professionals to promote the event.
On Facebook, the event has reached over 500,000 people and 100,000 on Instagram.
“For our first Festival, we broadcasted it live and had 260 people watching it the whole five hours. Our reach isn’t just through the audience, either, it’s the books and awards and socials,” said Borzi.
“There are 15 million people in the Greater Pacific and 26 million people in Australia, so this isn’t a small group of people. Of that group, most of them speak English. Our audience is global and most of our buyers come, surprisingly, from the US and the UK, so we publish these stories in a common language that everyone can understand. This is such a huge group of people and no one is really publishing their books.
“In terms of the Festival, brands have the opportunity to engage with quite a large demographic and get their name out there while celebrating Indigenous voices. The contributions they can make are endless. It could be advertising space, book publishing costs, writers workshops, that sort of thing. We could work with independent bookshops to promote our books, for instance. We’re really quite open to people coming to us with ideas and ways to connect,” Borzi added.
Rydges Sydney Airport and Rydges Fortitude Valley in Brisbane are providing accommodation and other support for Festival attendees.
Australian publishing houses have approached Borzi to promote books written by Indigenous authors, showing the reach and influence the Festival has been able to garner in just a few short years.
“It’s a testament to the kind of change we can bring along and the opportunities we can give to writers,” she added.
Plans for the Future
“We’re hoping to take our authors with their books on road shows both in Australia and internationally”.
Borzi is looking for partners and sponsorships to help realise this vision, “preferably independent bookshops”.
This year’s Festival will again be hosted by Disney choreographer and performer Peter Rockford Espiritu. Previous award winners are also expected to attend, including John W Kuri (2023 Book Award), Marlene dee Gray Potoura (2024 Book Award) and Richard Napam (2024 Book Award).
The Festival is a registered regulated audited charity run by volunteers. The fourth iteration of the First Nations Writers Festival will take place in Townsville on 30-31 May and will be broadcast live on 31 May.
