Today in brief: How do you think the media has gone during this election campaign?, The anthology as iTunes app, Brass Monkey builds ties with India and Booker favourite Tsiolkas takes inspiration from Scotland
Australian Booker nominee Christos Tsiolkas is cutting a swathe through Brit lit on his current visit to the UK with appearances at the Edinburgh International Book Festival.
Not only is The Slap a favourite to win the Booker this year it’s also the bestselling title according to The Bookseller with “sales [that] totalled 5,001 copies during the seven days to 7th August 2010”. Last year’s winner, Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel, has gone on to sell 485,000 copies to date, so a Tsiolkas win would mean mega-sales.
But it’s not all plain sailing. The Guardian called Tsiolkas' work “the most divisive book to have been chosen for the Man Booker longlist in years”. In the same article, Tsiolkas' defended a bolder approach to fiction: “In the English-language novel there is a fear of writing about the real world. I don’t read a lot of contemporary fiction that’s true to the world. I read to have my assumptions challenged, to be scared, to cry. That novel isn’t being written at the moment.”
The residency in Scotland has mostly been a chance for Tsiolkas to write and the environment has had an impact. The Guardian reports Tsiolkas taking inspiration from Glaswegians swimming in a freezing loch. Tsiolkas said: “My next novel will begin at Luss with an Aussie dipping his toe into the water of the loch and thinking, ‘Man, these people are crazy.’”
Publisher Kabita Dhara
Last week a new imprint appeared on Melbourne’s busy publishing scene, Brass Monkey Books, aiming to build closer ties between Australia and India.
Publisher Kabita Dhara has published two fiction titles by Indian author Anjum Hasan. She told the Wheeler Centre: “My aim is to introduce Australians to writing from India, in the hope that having this direct connection of words will foster a better cultural understanding… I’m hoping that, in the future, I can also take Australian writing to India.”
During the recent reports of violence against Indian students in Melbourne, Dhara was in India answering difficult questions about her hometown. “As an Australian of Indian heritage, this divide saddens me, and I think that trying to forge a better relationship through words and stories (directly, and not through a third country like the UK or the US) is my way of fighting what I see as a current weakening in the Australia-India relationship.”
Dhara has brought her author Hasan out as part of the Melbourne Writers Festival and Brisbane Writers Festival, and plans to release non-fiction books in the future.
Blogger Fatima Malik
Mark Latham reporting for 60 minutes is an attempt to bring American-style shock jock journalism to Australia which is more obsessed with personality than facts.
It was meant to shock us and excite us. It was meant to make us want more. Instead what Australians saw when Mark Latham questioned Julia Gillard on the campaign trail, was what it actually was; an interview lacking respect, carried out by someone desperate to inject himself back into the national spotlight.
Channel Nine was quick to apologise to Prime Minister Gillard, saying the interview lacked proper respect. However what did they expect when they hired Latham? Do they not remember this handshake? Or have they never read his weekly column for the Financial Review, always full of scathing attacks.
What Channel Nine was actually trying to do was duplicate Fox News style reporting. Fox News which consistently tops the ratings in the United States is famous for getting into fights with the White House and being home to Bill O’Reilly, who constantly berates and shouts at guests on his program. The Fox News model favours personality, invective and spectacle over facts. Perhaps that is why they hired Sarah Palin. Even I must admit it makes for gripping television just waiting for something else nonsensical to come out of her mouth. Is this what we are headed for?
Maybe Channel Nine was hoping Mark Latham could be their Sarah Palin, their own firebrand supplying an endless stream of gaffes and YouTube moments. In some ways Channel Nine has succeeded. All people have been talking about all week is Channel Nine, Mark Latham and now Laurie Oakes. However the public reaction to the Latham stunt shows that the Australian public isn’t buying it, at least not yet. They see it for what it really is: a distraction.
Some have said that the saga, in particular Laurie Oakes and Mark Latham feud which has emanated from it, is a win for old media in an election that has been dominated by Twitter. However it also represents the demise of old media.
60 minutes is one of the oldest institutions in Australian current affairs. However it has been on a downward spiral long before Latham. Long gone are George Negus, Jana Wendt and live reports from war zones. They have been replaced with interviews with celebrities and fillers sourced from American 60 minutes.
The response to Mark Latham’s report is therefore a win for new media. There are now enough alternatives to mainstream media that people feel comfortable criticising it and utilising other sources to get their news. Sunday night on Nine is no longer the only window into politics and world affairs.
Channel Nine seems to be persisting with the Latham experiment. Perhaps they are hoping this type of journalism will catch on. I for one sincerely hope it doesn’t.
This cross-post is from Express Media’s Electioneering blog, a regular look at what young people are thinking about the election campaign.
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