Call for Submissions: Copyright Agency’s Author Fellowship (Australia)

Deadline: 18 August 2025

The Copyright Agency’s Author Fellowship supports an established Australian author to create a new work for publication or performance and is open to novelists, playwrights, poets, children’s and young adult writers, picture book illustrators and journalists.

The Fellowship will provide sustained support for a year to one Australian author to create a significant new work (or a series of books if writing for children and young adults).

Funding Information

Amount of grant: $80,000.

Ineligible Activities

Book launches, production costs, publishing and printing costs, editing costs, and travel for promotional tours
Publishing costs, including self-publishing costs (where the author has made a financial contribution to the book’s editing, production, printing, publishing, marketing, or sales costs)
Marketing and promotion costs
Researcher costs/fees
Editors’, mentors’, and dramaturges’ fees
Competitions

Eligibility Criteria

To be eligible to apply for this grant, applicants must meet the following eligibility requirements:
- Have previously published/performed at least five full-length works of their own creative writing (of which two books may be self-published)
- Secured either a publishing contract for the work or a letter of interest or intent to publish from an Australian-based publisher/theatre company
- Authors must submit their own applications. Publishers cannot apply on behalf of authors.
- Be an Australian citizen or permanent resident
- Any overdue Cultural Fund grants must be acquitted

Application Requirements

You must submit the following support material with your application as a PDF via the Smarty Grants online system:
- A one-page synopsis of the proposed work.
- A sample of your writing/illustrations (up to 10 pages); include samples from your proposed project/new work or from previously published work (or a combination of both). For equity purposes with other applicants your sample should not exceed 10 pages.
- A one-page CV outlining your publication/performance history.
- Proof of a contract or letter of interest or intent to publish/present from a publisher/theatre company.
- If your project refers to, or involves First Nations individuals, communities or subject matter, you must submit a letter of support from the relevant individuals and communities.