Journal
Articles
The bronzista of Muradup
NICOLA WALKED WITH his back straight and his shoulders scarcely moving. His upper body perfectly balanced and relaxed, his...
Claiming the dead
THE CEREMONY TOOK place on a glorious morning in March at Cowra cemetery, the sky above a flawless blue,...
Know thy neighbour
WHENEVER THE DOORBELL rings late at night in our small Peking University apartment, we know who to expect. Our...
The uses and abuses of humiliation
One year I said I didn’t Want to be arrested. Back too frail to be man-handled. I settled for the dawn peace-vigil: Candles...
Set it down!
WAR IS A particularly slippery subject for any cold eye to fasten on. In May 2014 I was walking...
My grandfather’s head
I FORGOT THE ‘great pogrom’, as my grandmother Edith Bonyhady called Kristallnacht with the voice of experience. I was...
Recessional
The tumult and the shouting dies;The Captains and the Kings depart…Rudyard Kipling, ‘Recessional’ SAM COMES UP to her at work....
When I look upon the suffering
In Afghanistan, a widow receives my monthly stipend, a small apology as I monitor my intake of news, post a cheque but can’t stomach the...
Making nations
IT SEEMS POIGNANTLY appropriate that the web address gallipoli.net.au, which features the logo ‘Gallipoli: The Making of a Nation’,...

On ‘Bran Nue Dae’, by Jimmy Chi
Amid the fun and laughter of the film, memories of the original musical streamed back to me. I know it well; I spent time with Jimmy Chi and his partner, Glennys Allen, in Broome in the mid-1980s when he was working on the songs and the concept. I’d made my own road trip to Broome in a canary-yellow V8 station wagon that was covered with red dust.

On ‘Fox’, by Margaret Wild and Ron Brooks
FOX WAS A contemporary classic the minute it was published – an extraordinary picture book that has been acclaimed throughout...
Family first
When my teenage twin sister told me she was pregnant, I became angry. I called her a 'slut' and...