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Thursday 29 January
6 - 7pm
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Geraldine Brooks: Writing for life
The Sydney Writers Festival is back again at the State Library of NSW and we are livestreaming it!
Geraldine Brooks’ body of work is a landmark in Australian writing, spanning six novels, three non-fiction publications, decades of foreign reporting and two memoirs. She is the only Australian to have ever won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
From multi-award-winning works of sweeping historical fiction including the beloved March and Horse to the deeply personal Memorial Days and recent collaboration on Kamala Harris’s 107 Days, Geraldine’s writing has extraordinary scope and range. Hear Geraldine reflect on her craft and an illustrious career, in conversation with Richard Glover.
Book here
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Friday 6 February
5.30 - 6.30pm
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Kathy Lette: The Sisterhood Rules
For twins Isabel and Verity, the sisterhood rules were shattered when Verity had an affair with Isabel’s husband. Devastated by her sister’s betrayal, Isabel vowed never to speak to her again and for five years has kept her promise.
But when their mother goes missing, Verity and Isabel are forced to come together. When they do, they realise their problems are about to get worse. Join the beloved author of Puberty Blues, Kathy Lette,
to discuss her new novel, The Sisterhood Rules, a roller-coaster ride of love, scandal and heartbreak. In conversation with Holly Wainwright.
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Friday 13 February
5.30 - 6.30pm
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Tyree Barnette: Stolen Man on Stolen Land
When Tyree Barnette moved to Sydney from North Carolina, he knew little of his new home. Initially, he was pleasantly surprised to find Black American culture admired and celebrated. But in time, the undercurrents of racism in Australia came into view, as did the ongoing struggles of Indigenous Australians against injustice.
While watching from a distance as his homeland, the US, transformed through the rise of Trump and the Black Lives Matter Movement, Tyree learned the unique joy and pain of migration.
This is the perspective that has been missing from the race discussion in Australia, one that considers how privilege and race can shift across time and borders. Join Tyree, in conversation with Sweatshop’s Michael Mohammed Ahmad, to discuss his debut Stolen Man on Stolen Land, a poignant love letter to Australian multiculturalism and a clear-eyed exploration of its successes and its failings.
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Friday 20 February
5.30 - 6.30pm
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Mardi Gras Debate: Heterosexuality is a cult
The Festival’s signature rollicking debate takes to the State Library of NSW stage for a special Mardi Gras edition with everyone’s favourite adjudicator, Yumi Stynes.
Charting the rise of ‘boy meets girl’ as societal status quo and interrogating what it promises, six of our best and brightest will argue whether heterosexuality puts the ‘cult’ in cultural norm.
Two teams of our wittiest and most persuasive battle it out in the ultimate contest to determine, once and for all, is heterosexuality a cult? Featuring Dylin Hardcastle, Jess Hill, Benjamin Law, Maeve Marsden, Jess McGuire and Daniel Nour.
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Friday 27 February
5.30 - 6.30pm
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Najwan Darwish: No One Will Know You Tomorrow
No One Will Know You Tomorrow the multi-award nominated collection by Palestinian poet Najwan Darwish, brings together a decades-deep trove of powerful and urgent work.
Born in Jerusalem in 1978, Darwish has been described as one of the foremost poets of the Arab world. Incisive and lyrical, his work walks the razor’s edge between despair and resistance, between dark humour and harsh political realities.
Speaking to Sara M. Saleh, Najwan testifies to the anguished fatigue of waking up each morning in an occupied land and the immeasurable toll of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. His powerful poetic voice brings Palestinian experience to life.
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Friday 6 March
6pm - 7pm
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Red Dawn Over China with Frank Dikotter
They do not know that, sitting around the table, was someone poised to betray them all to the Gestapo – revealing their secret to the Nazis’ most ruthless detective.
In his latest release, The Traitorʼs Circle, multi-award-winning journalist and bestselling author Jonathan Freedland brings a remarkable tale of courage and resistance from the Third Reich to life.
Join Jonathan as he considers an age-old question with new for urgency for our time: what kind of person does it take to risk everything and stand up to tyranny?
Book here
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Saturday 7 March
11am
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Rachell Cockerell: Melting Point
On 7 June 1907, a ship packed with Russian Jews sets sail not to Jerusalem or New York, but to Texas.
Desperate to find a temporary homeland as Eastern Europe became infected by antisemitic violence, they were led by Rachel Cockerell’s great grandfather David Jochelmann and his best friend Israel Zangwill. This marked the beginning of the Galveston Movement, a forgotten moment in history in the lead-up to WWI.
Melting Point is a debut work of genre-bending
non-fiction following two families through both world wars, to London, New York and Jerusalem in a story that asks what it means to belong, and what can be salvaged from the past.
Join Rachel to uncover her highly inventive style, exclusive source materials and how she captured history as it unfolded. In conversation with Michaela Kalowski.
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Saturday 7 March
12.30pm
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Jonathan Freedland: The Traitors Circle
The history of modern China has long been portrayed as a tale of Communists fighting in the hills for freedom, gradually gaining popular support by taking land from the rich and giving it to the poor.
Drawing on a wealth of archival evidence, Frank Dikötter’s Red Dawn Over China reveals how unlikely the Party’s victory actually was, had it not been for the financial and military support of the Soviet Union.
In this riveting tale told with great narrative verve, Frank Dikötter reveals how thirteen delegates gathered in a dusty room in 1921 ended up raising the red flag over the Forbidden City in 1949, forever altering the course of history for a quarter of humanity and shaping the world as we know it today.
Join hosts Geraldine Doogue and Hamish Macdonald for ABC Radio National’s Global Roaming live, as they discuss how communism came to conquer China with special guest Frank Dikötter.
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