Creative Writing Teacher and Researcher

“Deborah Wardle writes heartfelt stories with clarity and compassion.” Carmel Bird

Deborah has taught creative writing and environmental literature subjects at University of Melbourne and RMIT University, and previously at La Trobe University and Federation University. She is a an outstanding lecturer and tutor, emphasising strong student engagement and rigour in the writing process. She has taught the Contemporary Ecofictions subject at Masters level at University of Melbourne. Her expertise is in writing climate fictions and eco-fiction narratives, and theory of creative writing methods.

Deborah’s research project “Understanding Aquifers through Groundwater Stories” with Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute (University of Melbourne) 2020-2022 successfully established multidisciplinary collaborations between hydrogeologists and creative writers to produce a collection of groundwater narratives written by participants. The work is published in a book, available as an ebook on this website.

Deborah has delivered academic papers at numerous conferences and spoken at gatherings of writers, including the Great Writing Conference in London, 2016. She regularly presents research papers at the biannual conference of ASLEC-ANZ, exploring the ways that groundwater is expressed in climate fiction. Her recent book published by Routledge (2023), Subterranean Imaginaries and Groundwater Narratives, is the culmination of over seven years of research and writing.