[Content warning: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander listeners should be aware that this podcast contains reference to deceased persons.] The fight for First Nations rights in Australia is ongoing, most recently frustrated by the lost 2023 Voice to Parliament referendum. Indigenous leader and author Thomas Mayo’s newest work, Always Was, Always Will Be: The Campaign for Justice and Recognition Continues , is a guidebook to action for Indigenous recognition and a rallying cry for those working...
Jun 27, 2025•48 min
What enables writers to grow and flourish? Writing is mostly a solitary pursuit that draws on individual reserves of talent and skill. But writers are also part of a national community that can help, or hinder, celebrate or ignore them. Ireland provides bountiful support to its writers and literary ecosystem, but Australia fails to adequately nurture its own. Listen to prominent writers Laureate for Irish Fiction Colm Tóibín ( Brooklyn , Long Island ) and Booker Prize–shortlisted author Charlott...
Jun 24, 2025•55 min
The novel has continued to evolve since its inception as a major literary form centuries ago. It has seen styles and genres come and go, adaptation and translation between languages and cultures and countless publishing trends and cycles. In this panel discussion featuring four extraordinary novelists, Rumaan Alam ( Entitlement ), Robbie Arnott ( Dusk ), Samantha Harvey ( Orbital ) and Torrey Peters ( Stag Dance ), join host Kate Evans (ABC Radio National’s The Bookshelf ) to consider the novel,...
Jun 19, 2025•1 hr 4 min
Join Benjamin Law and Artistic Director Ann Mossop as they discuss the 2025 Sydney Writers’ Festival program. The pair talk about the 2025 Festival theme, In This Together, and how books bring us closer to one another, our planet and ourselves. The 2025 Sydney Writers' Festival is out now. Head to our website to explore the program: https://www.swf.org.au/ Tickets on sale Saturday 15 March at 10am. Thank you to 2SER for facilitating the recording of this podcast. See omnystudio.com/listener for ...
Mar 13, 2025•39 min
Bruce Pascoe and Lyn Harwood invite us onto the Country they call home in Black Duck: A Year at Yumburra , reflecting on life after publishing Dark Emu . In the aftermath of devastating bushfires in north-eastern Victoria, the couple rebuilt their farm. Here, they run the Aboriginal social enterprise Black Duck Foods, committed to traditional food-growing processes that care for Country and give back to the community. Sit down with Bruce and Lyn, in conversation with Kerry O’Brien to explore how...
Mar 05, 2025•51 min
We all know the importance of literacy for school and life, but what happens when, despite all your efforts, reading just doesn’t “click”? Sally Rippin, the Australian Children’s Laureate and author of the book Wild Things: How we learn to read and what happens if we don’t is joined by journalist and Dyslexia advocate, Cat Rodie, in an exploration of literacy, education and those who often fall through the gaps. This episode was recorded live in May at the 2024 Sydney Writers’ Festival. If you e...
Feb 27, 2025•52 min
Jennifer Croft, Bri Lee and Louise Milligan have earned widespread acclaim in the realms of translation, non-fiction and investigative journalism, respectively. Now, these authors are branching out into novels for the first time in their illustrious careers, revisiting themes in their previous writing to create stunning, gripping and beguiling works of the imagination. Separate fact from fiction with Jennifer, Bri and Louise as they discuss the pleasures and pitfalls of braving a new genre. This...
Feb 18, 2025•50 min
Explore the literary histories of Charmian Clift, Shirley Hazzard and Elizabeth Harrower. Following her biography The Life and Myth of Charmian Clift , Nadia Wheatley contributed the afterword to The End of the Morning , Clift’s final manuscript, which was recently published more than 50 years after her death. Literary scholar Brigitta Olubas ( Shirley Hazzard: A Writing Life ) joins forces with journalist Susan Wyndham to edit Shirley Hazzard and Elizabeth Harrower: The Letters , which reveals ...
Feb 13, 2025•59 min
Humankind stands at a crossroads: will artificial intelligence make us superhumanly productive, liberating us from life’s most mundane tasks? Or have we opened Pandora’s box, unleashing sentient technology that will eventually destroy us? In a colossal contest of persuasion and wit, two teams of our best and brightest debate whether artificial intelligence is better than the real thing. Decide once and for all with team captains Annabel Crabb and David Marr, as they duke it out alongside teammat...
Feb 03, 2025•1 hr 9 min
Robyn Davidson once described Unfinished Woman as an “infinite book”. “I feel absolutely that I have to write it and absolutely that I can’t write it.” Twenty-five years in the making, this unforgettable memoir charts her expeditions since crossing the Gibson Desert with camels – the subject of her debut, Tracks , which her then-landlord, Doris Lessing, presciently declared “a classic”. Robyn’s exploits include having a “volcanic” love affair with Salman Rushdie in London, migrating with nomads ...
Jan 30, 2025•46 min
Some consider Pride and Prejudice the first romantic comedy, with Jane Austen having set the ground rules for others to follow. Certainly, with its witty heroine and enemies-to-lovers plotting, Pride and Prejudice has created many of the tropes we continue to see in rom-coms today. YA authors Kate and Angourie Rice ( Stuck up and Stupid ), Sophie Gonzales ( The Perfect Guy Doesn't Exist ) and Gabrielle Tozer ( The Unexpected Mess of it All ) talk with Nathan Luff about Austen’s lasting influence...
Jan 28, 2025•55 min
What kind of world could we create if we stopped believing inequality is the price of progress? Archaeology professor David Wengrow’s groundbreaking book, The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity , co-authored with the late David Graeber, overturns the theories of Yuval Noah Harari ( Sapiens ), Jared Diamond ( Guns, Germs, and Steel ) and Steven Pinker ( Enlightenment Now ). Challenging dominant narratives that the agricultural revolution meant abandoning an egalitarian Eden, the book u...
Jan 23, 2025•53 min
In Your Favourites’ Favourites, our most loved writers introduce one of their favourite authors. Acclaimed Women & Children author Tony Birch sits down with debut writer Graham Akhurst, a Fulbright Scholar who drafted his YA novel, Borderland , while studying in renowned writing program at Hunter College in New York City. This gripping coming-of-age story follows a city-born First Nations teenager on an epic quest to figure out who he is. Join Tony and Graham as they discuss First Nations id...
Jan 21, 2025•50 min
If you thought you knew the backstory of The Teacher's Pet , the gripping whodunnit podcast downloaded by over 80 million listeners, think again. Two-time Gold Walkley Award–winning investigative journalist Hedley Thomas’ book takes readers behind the scenes of the podcast investigation with a blow-by-blow account of one of the most intriguing and enduring murder mysteries of our time. Get the scoop as Hedley reveals to Matthew Condon how fresh leads, old evidence and a groundswell of public att...
Jan 16, 2025•53 min
“The past is a foreign country”, L.P. Hartley famously wrote. It is also a place readers can visit via masterful historical fiction. Be transported by esteemed panellists Francesca de Tores ( Saltblood ), Mirandi Riwoe ( Sunbirds ) and Abraham Verghese ( The Covenant of Water ) as they discuss the magic of bringing history to life for contemporary audiences. Learn how these authors conjure the past to make sense of the present and convincingly intertwine fact and fiction in their prose. Hosted b...
Jan 14, 2025•50 min
Imagine another world with the fantasy writers who are redefining the wildly popular genre. Australian fantasy heavyweight Garth Nix (The Old Kingdom series) takes to the stage with ascending local star Shelley Parker-Chan (The Radiant Emperor duology) and global sensation Samantha Shannon (The Roots of Chaos series) to explain how they create expansive universes for their epic stories, heroes and heroines. This is must-listen episode for YA and fantasy fans alike! Hosted by Aimée Lindorff. This...
Dec 18, 2024•51 min
She may be self-absorbed, adrift or unhinged, but the ‘sad girl’ is taking the publishing industry by storm. Debut novelists Nadine J. Cohen ( Everyone and Everything ), Madeleine Gray ( Green Dot ) and Jessie Stephens ( Something Bad is Going to Happen ) have all created unforgettable protagonists who are fallible, at times unlikeable and painfully relatable. Hear from these exciting debut novelists as they discuss making and breaking this emerging genre’s rules, and how they crafted compelling...
Dec 17, 2024•50 min
From parched paddocks to sleepy coastal towns, the bodies keep piling up – and Australian readers can’t get enough. This panel brings together some of Australia’s hottest local crime writers, with Sulari Gentill ( The Mystery Writer ), Dinuka McKenzie ( Tipping Point ) and Benjamin Stevenson ( Everyone on this Train is a Suspect ). Dust off your Akubra for a thrilling chat about the outback noir genre and what makes Aussie crime fiction unique, with host Alex Adsett. This episode was recorded li...
Dec 10, 2024•1 hr
In the wake of a shift in the global power balance, how can Australia best protect itself? Two of Australia’s most interesting foreign policy thinkers take a fresh look at Australia’s place in the world and come to some surprising conclusions. Clinton Fernandes ( Sub-Imperial Power ) and Sam Roggeveen ( The Echidna Strategy: Australia’s Search for Power and Peace ) tackle the big questions about the US alliance, the threat of China, and underneath it all, what kind of country Australia really is...
Dec 06, 2024•48 min
What is the writer’s role in an era of profound ecological change? This panel event brings together leading local nature writers James Bradley and Bruce Pascoe to discuss how best to defend our environment. James’ latest book, Deep Water: The World in the Ocean , dives into the waves, and Bruce’s Black Duck: A Year at Yumburra investigates traditional agricultural practices that offer a blueprint for our farming futures. Reflect on our relationship with the natural world and what lies ahead, as ...
Dec 02, 2024•50 min
"People have crazy lives," says Paul Murray. "The stuff that happens to – quote-unquote – ordinary folks is very operatic." Case in point: his Booker Prize shortlisted The Bee Sting which follows an unravelling household in the Irish Midlands who embody Tolstoy's proverb about unhappy families. Paul's third novel has been acclaimed by critics as “generous, expansive and glorious as a cathedral” ( The Guardian ). One of three superb Irish writers at this year's Festival, this is your chance to ca...
Nov 28, 2024•58 min
Four waves in, the feminist fight for gender equality is far from over. This panel brings together the powerful and incendiary feminist voices of Hannah Ferguson, Sisonke Msimang and Jennifer Robinson. Hear from these leading writers and activists who between them offer daring feminist opinions on topics ranging from freedom of speech, right-wing politics, racism, xenophobia, belonging and identity, taboos around sex and pleasure, as well as the legal judgements that continue to silence and disa...
Nov 21, 2024•53 min
Last year, Bryan Brown interviewed Sam Neill at the Festival. This year, it was Bryan’s turn in the hot seat as Sam interviewed him about his gripping new crime novel, The Drowning . Bryan is one of the most recognisable faces on our screens with more than 80 film and television projects to his name. This sensational new thriller with his characteristic laconic style – humorous, tough and suspenseful – confirms his place as one of the great Australian storytellers. This episode was recorded live...
Nov 14, 2024•55 min
Going deep into the historical past, Lauren Groff ( The Vaster Wilds , Matrix ) and Francesca de Tores ( Saltblood ) create memorable heroines, real and imaginary, whose stories have not been told. Their portrayals of ordinary women doing extraordinary things – a girl escaping alone into the wilderness, a pirate on the high seas – are richly detailed and vividly alive. Coming out of hiding into our imaginations, these heroines are so fierce they jump off the page. Join Lauren and Francesca in co...
Nov 12, 2024•1 hr
Join two of the most admired writers in Australia today, Booker Prize–winning Richard Flanagan and Miles Franklin–winning Anna Funder as they discuss writing in the margins between fiction and non-fiction, history and memoir, personal and public. Historian Clare Wright leads this conversation, examining their genre-bending masterpieces. Through a hypnotic melding of dream, history, science and memory, Question 7 traces the ripples of history through Richard’s own family and is described by Anna ...
Nov 06, 2024•1 hr 3 min
While everyone has dirty laundry in their lives, not everyone will choose to air theirs publicly. Whether on social media, in written memoir, public speaking or on television, how can sharing the ‘self’ when the story touches on family and community, still be navigated ethically? What are the consequences and ramifications of bringing the personal into the public realm? Join writers Benjamin Law, Rhys Nicholson and Amy Thunig as they unpack the fallout on the other side of publication, with host...
Oct 29, 2024•49 min
Sean Turnell spent almost two years in Myanmar’s terrifying Insein Prison, accused of being a spy. Ma Thida was also incarcerated there, where, denied medical treatment, she came very close to dying. How did they survive? What hope do these important players in Myanmar’s government and politics hold for the return of democracy three years after the military seized power in a coup? In conversation with Catherine Renshaw. This event was presented in partnership with PEN Sydney and recorded live in...
Oct 22, 2024•51 min
Melissa Lucashenko describes her latest novel, Edenglassie , as her “big book” – a multigenerational epic that torches Queensland’s colonial myths and reimagines Australia’s future. Set in Brisbane and rivalling the romances of Too Much Lip and Mullumbimby , two parallel love stories play out two centuries apart. In both the colonial era and the present day, no one knows how far legacies will reach into modern lives. Sit down with this celebrated author as she is joined on stage by ABC RN’s Kate...
Oct 15, 2024•59 min
Following broadcaster and author Julia Baird’s multi-award-winning international bestseller, Phosphorescence , comes a beautiful and timely exploration of that most mysterious but necessary human quality: grace. Bright Shining: How grace changes everything asks what grace looks like today, how we recognise it, nurture it within ourselves and express it. For Julia, grace can be found by being kinder, bigger and better with each other. Sit down with Julia to discuss this luminous work, which The G...
Oct 09, 2024•50 min
As conflict plays out across an unnamed region, the protagonist in Parramatta Laureate of Literature Yumna Kassab’s Politica imagines how she will later narrate her experiences: “We hadn’t spoken for years but then the war broke out...” Sharing difficult stories is also at the heart of Miles Franklin Award winner Shankari Chandran’s Safe Haven , which follows a refugee threatened with deportation when she speaks out for other detainees. Sit down with Yumna and Shankari as they discuss their poig...
Oct 03, 2024•51 min
