Welcome to GR Online, a series of short-form articles that take aim at the moving target of contemporary culture as it’s whisked along the guide rails of innovations in digital media, globalisation and late-stage capitalism.
Camelopard
MOST OF THE time, I know I’m human. There’s a buttoned flap to fuss with when it’s time to eat,...
The open-plan office
DR X TREMBLED with excitement. The hall was quiet, deserted, but behind every closed door she knew that there...
A short history of guns in America
The first firearm was the Chinese fire lance, a gunpowder-filled bamboo tube first depicted on a tenth-century silk banner from the Gansu Province in Western China. Early incarnations of the fire lance were used mainly for shock value in melees – the weapon little more than a glorified firework attached to a spear.
The day after the storm
AT FIRST, THE black clouds gathered as if in contemplation. Like a herd of dark thoughts, they quickly gave...
The memory clinic
THE PROCEDURE WOULD be painless, the white-smocked facilitator assured her. Lee sat almost catatonic as the translucent wires were...
The Closure Company
THEIR SIGNS USED a distinctive shade of blue. It was a colour they’d patented, like Tiffany Blue, though the...
A woman alone
Dedicated to Susan-Gaye Anderson THERE’S NO POINT making it up. An eminent Australian historian, a woman, once said of an...
Snake of Light
Listen to Loki Liddle reading ‘Snake of light’. HE SOUND OF buzzing filled the dodgy motel room, bouncing off the dirty tiles and...
Preparing for the inevitable: Five states of mind
Griffith Review · Joshua Lobb reading Preparing For The Inevitable from Griffith Review 72: States of Mind You have ten...
Blue crane
Listen to Inga Simpson read ‘Blue crane’. THOSE FIRST WEEKS Sally walked the beach, it went unread. She saw only a scallop of...
Provenance
THEY WENT TO a broker. Working their way through the maze of the air market felt beyond them, if...
Inheritance
FIVE OR SIX days after the funeral, or perhaps a week, Rory finally ventures out. Her father’s dog, Harpo,...
