Hidden Author
Shaun Tan is an author and illustrator, originally from Perth, Western Australia. He studied Fine Arts and Literature at the University of Shaun Tan (photograph by Stefan Tell)Western Australia, and graduated with joint honours in 1995. His illustrated books deal with social, political and historical subjects through surreal dream-like imagery. He has received numerous awards, including the CBCA ( ... (read more)
Queensland Theatre Season 2017
Queensland Theatre’s 2017 season kicks off with several productions that explore themes of politics, race, religion, romance, film, and business. Already the program’s diversity has generated much interest. According to Artistic Director Sam Strong, ‘some performances have already sold out’.
One highlight is Joanna Murray-Smith’s adaptation of Ingmar Berg ... (read more)
In this week’s ABR podcast Peter Rose talks to Colin Golvan QC – a lawyer specialising in intellectual property – about new threats to Australian creativity, chiefly the proposed removal of restrictions on parallel importation, as recommended by the Productivity Commission.
Colin Golvan's article 'The god of cheaper prices: New threats to our literary culture from the Productivity Commiss ... (read more)
TRUMPERY
Dear Editor,Sandy Thorne seems to think Donald Trump can restore America to prosperity and its past greatness (Letters, October 2016). All great nations rise, decline, and fall. If Caligula can put his horse Incitatus forward as a Senator, I suppose it’s possible that the American people just might vote in Donald Trump as president. As Bob Dylan sang ‘The answer is blowin’ in the w ... (read more)
OUR NEW LAUREATE
Australian Book Review is thrilled to name Robyn Archer as our new Laureate. She joins David Malouf, who became the inaugural Laureate in 2014.
Robyn Archer is primarily, and famously, a singer. She made her professional début in 1974 as Annie 1 in the Australian première of Brecht and Weill’s The Seven Deadly Sins (a role she reprised in the 1990s). Other celebrated roles h ... (read more)
Art Issue – 10 November
ABR will celebrate the launch of our bumper Arts issue with a special event at the Monash University Museum of Art (Caulfield) at 6pm on 10 November. Find out what the likes of Jacki Weaver, Leo Schofield, and Robyn Archer rated as the outstanding arts productions of the year. At this event we will also introduce our new ABR Laureate, who will join inaugural ABR Laureate ... (read more)
Voices from America
Nina Stemme and Stuart Skelton in The Metropolitan Opera's Tristan und Isolde (photograph by Ken Howa
ABR Editor Peter Rose was in the United States recently to conduct a literary/arts tour of the northeastern United States. In addition to visiting sites that produced some of America's greatest literary figures, the tour party also attended a performance of Tristan und Isolde ... (read more)
Feeble times
Dear Editor,Alan Atkinson's study of national conscience and how it has functioned in Australia is timely ('How Do We Live With Ourselves?' September 2016). Returning to the eighteenth century, he argues that such a thing as a national conscience might exist but that it is 'especially feeble' at present. Naturally, this feebleness is seen and expressed in Australia's policies on offs ... (read more)
BRAGGING RIGHTS
Advances was delighted to see that Ashley Hay's ABR Dahl Trust Fellowship essay 'The forest at the edge of time', published in our October 2015 Environment issue, has been shortlisted for the 2016 Bragg UNSW Press Prize for Science Writing. The Bragg Prize is for short non-fiction pieces of science writing aimed at a general audience. Also on this year's shortlist are pieces by Ja ... (read more)