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Australian Book Review
Picador has done rather well in this year’s Miles Franklin Literary Award (worth $28,000), with three of the five short-listed novels: Richard Flanagan’s Gould’s Book of Fish, Joan London’s Gilgamesh and Tim Winton’s Dirt Music. Completing the quintet are Steven Carroll’s Art of the Engine Driver (Flamingo) and John Scott’s The Architect (Viking). The winner will be announced in Sydn ... (read more)
What a piece of work
It’s rare for different genres to appear on a Miles Franklin Award shortlist: it’s even rarer when partners appear on the same shortlist. This year we have a bit of both. Among the six shortlisted titles are The Prosperous Thief, by Andrea Goldsmith, and Wild Surmise, by Dorothy Porter. The latter marks Porter’s second appearance on a Miles Franklin Award shortlist, her ... (read more)
Vale Glen Tomasetti
Glen Tomasetti (born in 1929) – author, poet and folksinger – died on June 25. Tomasetti’s 1976 novel, Thoroughly Decent People, was the first book published by McPhee Gribble (the second was Helen Garner’s Monkey Grip). Her novel Man of Letters was adapted for the ABC by Alma de Groen. Tomasetti continued to write poetry into her last months. Her uncompleted biography ... (read more)
Clive James in Mildura
The Mildura Writers’ Festival, held over a weekend in late July, consolidated its reputation as one of Australia’s most pleasurable literary festivals. When, we wonder, will tout Melbourne and Sydney realise how good it is, and make the journey. Clive James opened the festival with a memorable lecture on questions of celebrity and the poetry of Philip Hodgins. We have m ... (read more)
Viva L’Italia!
The ABR Forums move to Sydney early next month, when Peter Porter and Peter Robb will be in conversation with Ros Pesman of the University of Sydney about all things Italian – literature, music, visual arts, politics and travel. Peter Porter has written about Italy for decades; Peter Robb is the author of Midnight in Sicily and M: The Man Who Became Caravaggio. No one intereste ... (read more)
Shimmying
Dear Editor.
It was a delight to go to my mailbox this morning and find the February issue of ABR. Two glimpses as I flicked through it have given me enough pleasure to last for the rest of the day, at least. One was to read Dorothy Porter’s poem, ‘Travel’. It is a moving and memorable epitaph for a great poet and performer, a ‘plucky traveller bird’. One question: is ‘shim ... (read more)
Black Saturday
The devastating Victorian bushfires of early February seem to have changed the state forever. The death toll, still not confirmed as we go to print, is incredible. The natural environment, always fragile in this state, has never seemed so vulnerable. It will take decades to recover.
Our condolences go to all the victims of the fires. Few Victorians were unaffected, directly or in ... (read more)
300 and all that!
Next month marks the 300th issue of ABR. We’re feeling very generous as we approach this milestone. We invite current subscribers to give away a free six-month subscription to ABR when they renew. This is your chance to introduce a friend or colleague to ABR (recipients of these gifts must not be current or recently lapsed subscribers). All you have to do is to complete the co ... (read more)
(for the siblings)
they are there on the cusp of alittle hill, in the trampled splendour
of a suburban yard. they are three,elephantine trunks standing against a
background of untidy sky, their oilyconfidences drab on Escher limbs,
and the still bricks and lost picketsheighten the haecceity of these three.
I go and sit with them often. I sitbetween them, face to a bleary just-risen
moon and ... (read more)