The Shape of a Reading Life
There are books you save from childhood, a few that somehow survive through an untidy life. I was fourteen when I bought The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich by William L. Shirer. I know because I wrote the date inside.
Our family, after the end of the Argus, read the Sun every day. I bought the Saturday Age for the book reviews. In my reading habits my library borrowings were sliding from children’s books into the adult section. My much-used borrowing number was 54J.
The Shirer was large and bold: black, white and red front dustjacket with twisted cross centre of page. It’s faded now but the top page edges were an elegant purple. I had a Saturday morning job and with weekly lay-by instalments it was mine. The American journalist historian brought me into an adult world and locked in place a narrative framework of what had happened just before I was born. I had no problem believing Adorno (even if I didn’t know who he was) when he said, “There can be no poetry after…
Madam: Archbishop Fisher (July-August 2024) does not resist the attacks on his church by the political, social or scientific atheists and those who insist on not being told what to do.
Aug 29 2024
6 mins
To claim Aborigines have the world's oldest continuous culture is to misunderstand the meaning of culture, which continuously changes over time and location. For a culture not to change over time would be a reproach and certainly not a cause for celebration, for it would indicate that there had been no capacity to adapt. Clearly this has not been the case
Aug 20 2024
23 mins
A friend and longtime supporter of Quadrant, Clive James sent us a poem in 2010, which we published in our December issue. Like the Taronga Park Aquarium he recalls in its 'mocked-up sandstone cave' it's not to be forgotten
Aug 16 2024
2 mins