culture

Isabella Trimboli Early in Mothercare , a hospital room offers a good analogy for the incompetence of the American healthcare system. Lynne Tillman’s mother has had a seizure and is rushed to hospital in an ambulance. Once she gets there, she’s barely lucid,...

Jeff Sparrow In 1984, the historian Geoffrey Blainey sparked a nationwide debate by denouncing the government for its supposed preference towards Asian migrants. The subsequent normalisation of the far right means Blainey’s comments no longer shock as they once...

Brooke Boland Award-winning novelist and essayist Gregory Day has written widely on subjects as varied as the powerful owl and Australian poetry. Many of his nonfiction essays have appeared in notable literary publications over the years, each demonstrating Day’s...

Leah Jing McIntosh The peculiar thing about grief is that the world continues. Or, as Amanda Svensson writes, “Nothing ever ends, but everything ends.” Svensson’s newest novel, A System So Magnificent It Is Blinding , considers how different textures of loss are...

John Kinsella In his 14th collection, Harvest Lingo , Murri poet Lionel Fogarty continues his decades-long commitment to disrupting colonial language, colonial thought and their machineries of oppression. Fogarty creates poems in which language is liberated,...

Annie Smithers The origins of particular foods, drinks and specific dishes are a fascination for many. Everyday items such as cornflakes and Nutella have origin stories. Many of these origins come from failures, mistakes or simple serendipitous events. Oscar...

Elizabeth Flux Where does Jo belong? Not back in England. Not in art school. Not even in Sydney, as the life she has just started to build is slipping away. So, with no clear path ahead, wanting adventure, wanting a clean slate – and needing to fulfil her visa...

Geordie Williamson The history of postwar German literature was written by the defeated. Poet Paul Celan, for example, wrote in German despite it being the language of those who sent his parents to the gas chambers, seeking to cleanse even words of their bloodstains...

Justine Hyde Genre fiction has long been snubbed as inferior to serious literary fiction in Australia. This seems to be shifting, at least incrementally. Romance fiction – which sells like hot cakes – now makes the occasional appearance on writers festival...