Stephen Oliver b. 1950. Grew in Brooklyn-west, Wellington, New Zealand. One year Magazine Journalism course, Wellington Polytechnic. Radio NZ Broadcasting School. Casual Radio Actor. Lived in Paris, Vienna, London, San Francisco, Greece and Israel. Signed on with the radio ship, ‘The Voice of Peace’ broadcasting in the Mediterranean out of Jaffa.
Free lanced as production voice, newsreader, announcer, voice actor, journalist, radio producer, copy and features writer. Poems extensively published in print and online journals in New Zealand, Australia, Japan, Ireland, USA, UK, South Africa, Canada, etc. Recently published titles are: Deadly Pollen, a poetry chapbook, Word Riot Press, Middletown, NJ, 2003, Ballads, Satire & Salt – A Book of Diversions, Greywacke Press, Sydney, 2003. Stephen Oliver is a transtasman poet and writer based in Sydney.
He has now completed the final, mixed down master recording of poems and music titled, KING HIT - Selected Readings. Poems written and read by Stephen Oliver with original music composed by Matt Ottley; an unique collaboration designed for international release.
Audio (Quicktime Required)
Stephen Oliver reads from KING HIT – Selected Readings:
• Stalin’s Cotton Socks - High
| Low
• Emblem For Dead Youth - High
| Low
Poetry
Henwise / poem-cycle (Hawk Press, Wellington, 1975)
& Interviews (Horizontal Press, Wellington, 1978)
Autumn Songs / poem-cycle (Horizontal Press, Auckland, 1978)
Letter To James K. Baxter / poem (Horizontal Press, Auckland, 1980)
Earthbound Mirrors (Horizontal Press, Auckland, 1984)
Guardians, Not Angels (Hazard Press, Christchurch, 1993)
Islands of Wilderness - A Romance (Penguin Books, Australia, 1996)
Election Year Blues / poem (Pork Barrel Press, Sydney, 1999)
Unmanned (HeadworX, Wellington, 1999)
Night of Warehouses: Poems 1978-2000 (HeadworX, Wellington, 2001)
Deadly Pollen , Middletown, NJ, (Word Riot Press, USA, 2003)
Ballads, Satire & Salt - A Book of Diversions, (Greywacke Press, Sydney, 2003)
Recordings
EARTHBOUND MIRRORS, Odes Records Label, Auckland, New Zealand, 1984, (cassette).
Poems recorded by the author for Aotearoa New Zealand Poetry Sound Archive, Special Collections, University of Auckland Library, 2004; for Synaptic Graffiti Collective: Slam the Body Politik (multi-media) CD, Brisbane, 2004; Wordjammin', CD, 2ser fm, Sydney, 2004.
Film
A 35mm film short based on the poem "Something In The Air" read by the author to an original music score by Bob Jackson, jazz musician, and directed by Allan MacGillivray. The film screened at the Auckland International Film Festival, 1986. Screened at the Roma Theatre, Sydney, dist. CEL, 1987.
Anthologies
A Cage of Words ed., Harvey McQueen., (Longman Paul, 1980)
Doors , ed., Terry Locke, University of Waikato, (Leaders Press, 2000)
Jewels in the Water ed., Terry Locke, University of Waikato, (Leaders Press, 2000)
Time’s Collision with the Tongue Newcastle Poetry Prize Anthology ed., Jan Owen, Peter Boyle. (Coal River Press, Newcastle 2000)
Subversions: Queensland Poetry Festival 1997-2001 Anthology (CD) 2001
REAL FIRE , A Counter-Anthology, ed., Bernard Gadd, (Square One Press, 2001)
Open Boat, Barbed Wire Sky – poems for refugees , ed., Sue Hicks and Danny Gardner, Sydney, (Live Poets Press, 2003)
Greatest Hits Anthology, JAAM 21 1984 - 2004, ed., Michael O’Leary / Mark Pirie, (HeadworX/ESAW, 2004)
Rivers of Verse, A Tasmanian Journey 1800-2004, edited by Helen Gee, (Back River Press, Buckland / Tasmania, 2004)
Stephen Oliver's voice production experience covers 30 years in the broadcasting industries and related media throughout Australia and New Zealand. He is available for private voice instruction, orchestral narration, voice acting, poetry recordings, school tours, broadcasts, public and sponsored readings, workshops, guest appearances as professional reader and poet at local and international literary festivals, etc.
For a comprehensive bibliography, see the Australian Literature Gateway,
accessible through State and and university library systems.
The complete texts of Unmanned, Night of Warehouses: Poems 1978-2000,
and Deadly Pollen , are now freely available as e-books from Project Gutenberg: http://gutenberg.net/find Oxford Text Archive, and, Online Books Page / University of Pennsylvania.
Contact: PO Box 1662, Strawberry Hills, Sydney NSW 2012, fax: +61 2 97999484, email: sao@smartchat.net.au.
