Walking through the mou(r)n(ing of a)tain(ted life)

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A picture of a vacant theatre with red velvet chairs

My tiny green teacher

In June 2025, I was one of the many people emotionally wounded by a viral video clip of a little puppet named Tiny Chef (affectionately known as Cheffy) receiving some bad news. I hadn’t heard of this character and his playful children’s show, but the clip had a profound effect on me. It depicts a more potent vulnerability than many human skits achieve.

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Escaping the frame

In ConversationAll my work as a writer and activist over the last fifty years has comprised various attempts at what I call ‘escaping the frame of European colonisation, European story and European ways of telling story’.

Glitter and guts

Non-fiction RIGHT NOW, I am obsessed with the past. My debut novel is finished and ready for publication, and I am wrestling with the fear...

Apocalypse, then?

FictionWriting took almost everything from me. Most afternoons, I’d arrive home from teaching classrooms of uninterested students, have a little Henry time, defrost a ready-to-eat supermarket meal, open a bottle of shiraz and write until midnight. Most weekends, I’d start writing once the hangover wore off, break for lunch, and then write again until dinner. It wasn’t just punishing on my physical health, it ruined my relationships, most recently with Greg, who said I’d die miserable and alone if I maintained my grim routine. And for what? The occasional acceptance from an obscure journal read by twelve other short-story writers?