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This Australian classic follows the lives of two Australian orphans, Caro and Grace Bell, who move to England in search of a better life. It’s a heartbreaking tale of unrequited passionate longing.Mi…
Join the cream of Australia’s theatre crop for this very special event to celebrate the publication of Colin Batrouney’s second novel, Creative Writing for Beginners.Actor Geoffrey Rush, director…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Born to a world without welcome, Isobel observes it warily – an alien trying to pass for a native. She’s more at ease with imaginary friends than the flesh-and-blood people she meets.Cate Kennedy…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Tash Aw’s third – and ‘most personal’ – novel, Five Star Billionaire, follows four Malaysian characters trying to make it in the new China, where the megacity of Shanghai is the new New York.Aw’s…
Kate Atkinson’s first book, Behind the Scenes of the Museum, beat Salman Rushdie to win the Whitbread Book of the Year.Since then, she’s captured readers' hearts with her tough-but-empathetic…
Sylvia Nasar’s megabestseller A Beautiful Mind was ‘perhaps the best economics-related book of the past quarter-century’, according to the New York Times.This master storyteller has a knack for…
Our fabulous double bills are back – bringing you three big nights of international writers, presented back-to-back.From genre-bending fiction bestsellers to young adult authors with cult…
William Dalrymple is an award-winning writer and director of India’s Jaipur literary festival. He fell in love with India aged eighteen, and the country has been at the centre of his writing since.Hi…
Our fabulous double bills are back – bringing you three big nights of international writers, presented back-to-back.From genre-bending fiction bestsellers to young adult authors with cult…
Anita Desai has been shortlisted three times for the Booker Prize; the Guardian recently called her ‘India’s greatest living writer’.Her latest book, The Artist of Disappearance, blends irony…
Barcelona-born, LA-based author Carlos Ruiz Zafón writes fantastical literary thrillers packed with intrigue and adventure – with books themselves at the very centre of his stories.His admirers…
Our fabulous double bills are back – bringing you three big nights of international writers, presented back-to-back.From genre-bending fiction bestsellers to young adult authors with cult…
Patrick Ness is one of those writers whose darkly complex books for children and teenagers transcend their intended audience, winning him fans of all ages – and deservedly so.His Chaos Walking
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
We’ve created an Australian Classics book club, just for you – with special writerly guests each month.Last year’s hugely popular Australian Literature 101 set the scene by introducing ten texts our …
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
J.M. Coetzee is one of the world’s most prized literary treasures – and we’re lucky enough to have him living right here in Australia.The first author to win the Booker Prize twice, he won the Nobel …
J.M. Coetzee is one of the world’s most prized literary treasures – and we’re lucky enough to have him living right here in Australia.The first author to win the Booker Prize twice, he won the Nobel …
We’ve created an Australian Classics book club, just for you – with special writerly guests each month.Last year’s hugely popular Australian Literature 101 set the scene by introducing ten texts our …
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
In Midnight in Peking, renowned China commentator Paul French solved a grisly, long-forgotten true crime story which shocked the one-time inhabitants of pre-communist Beijing’s infamous nightlife…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
When bestselling Scottish crime writer Ian Rankin swept through Australia to promote his book Standing in Another Man’s Grave, he dropped into the Wheeler Centre to chat about the return of Rebus…
A.M. Homes’ latest novel, May We Be Forgiven, began life as a short story commissioned by Zadie Smith. Salman Rushdie calls it ‘flat-out amazing’. Jeanette Winterson is a fan.Homes has long had a…
Nigerian-born Chika Unigwe has been praised as ‘one of the most probing, thought-provoking writers of the recent renaissance in African fiction’.She tells stories of African women oppressed by…
In this edition of our Texts in the City series, focussing on VCE English texts, join Tony Birch and Josephine Rowe explore the secrets and tensions in Raymond Carver’s 1976 short story collection…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
We’ve created an Australian Classics book club, just for you – with special writerly guests each month.Last year’s hugely popular Australian Literature 101 set the scene by introducing ten texts our …
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Let the wild rumpus start!The Wheeler Centre kicks off our first season of events with a celebration of storytelling that revels in the deepest recesses of the imagination. This year, we dedicate…
Rock star writer Neil Gaiman has a reputation for reinventing genres – and for following his imagination wherever it leads. He’s written everything from journalism to episodes of Doctor Who, fantasy …
David Shields has been hailed as a writing revolutionary. His wildly inventive ‘manifesto’ Reality Hunger, a broadside against the contemporary novel, has been welcomed with open arms by novelists…
There’s a huge public appetite for non-fiction storytelling in all its forms, from literary and political essays to the shelf-filling genre of memoir, and the much-maligned reality TV.This is a…
Helen Garner’s narrative non-fiction is practically its own genre, attracting international acclaim. Her landmark The First Stone, a controversial bestseller, broke new ground for Australian…
By Julianne SchultzIn this edited version of the introduction to Griffith Review 38: The Novella Project, editor Julianne Schultz tells us what’s so special about the novella as a literary art form…
And now for something completely different … we’re delighted to present everyone’s favourite travel addict, Michael Palin. (And we’re getting the Monty Python jokes out of the way before he gets…
Michael Palin was first famous as ‘the nice one’ in the Monty Python team (despite fraudulently selling John Cleese a dead parrot), then as an actor in films from Brazil to A Fish Called Wanda. He’s …
Most Melburnians know Lily Brett as a literary bestseller, her novels peopled with wisecracking Holocaust survivors obsessed with food and death. But in the swinging sixties, she was a rock…
As a bonus to celebrate our AMERICA series, here’s a video-only interview with American poet, novelist and writer of short fiction Ron Rash. He discusses his decision to properly explore writing as a…
Q: What’s as Australian as Vegemite and as American as apple pie? A: The new issue of McSweeney’s, the US literary journal so hip it should be wearing black-framed glasses and riding a bicycle.…
We’ve recently welcomed our second round of Hot Desk Fellowships, supported by the Readings Foundation, to the Wheeler Centre.We bid a sad farewell to our first round of fellows: Luke Ryan, Mel…
The Wheeler Centre and MIFF are proud to present the Adrian Wootton Illustrated Film Talks, supported by MIFF 37 South Market & Accelerator. Adrian Wootton is co-director of Dickens 2012, the…
The Wheeler Centre and MIFF are proud to present the Adrian Wootton Illustrated Film Talks, supported by MIFF 37 South Market & Accelerator. Adrian Wootton is co-director of Dickens 2012, the…
The Wheeler Centre and MIFF are proud to present the Adrian Wootton Illustrated Film Talks, supported by MIFF 37 South Market & Accelerator. Adrian Wootton is co-director of Dickens 2012, the…
Jodi Picoult has created her own genre. She writes edge-of-your-seat stories about everyday people facing extraordinary situations, inviting her readers to wonder: what would I do?Between the Lines, …
Between the Lines – Jodi Picoult’s first book for young readers, co-written with her daughter Samantha Van Leer – is for every girl who’s believed, however whimsically, that her one true soulmate…
Sex, sex, sex… and celebrity. Not all storytelling is about boarding schools, bloodsuckers and bow-slinging lady killers. In this adults-only night of fantastical tales, anything goes. Four writers s…
On the back of the release of Inheritance – his fourth book – bestselling fantasy sensation Christopher Paolini joined us (in partnership with Melbourne Writers' Festival) for an hour of lively…
In this instalment of our Texts in the City series, host Ruby Murray discusses The Rugmaker of Mazar-e-Sharif with co-authors Robert Hillman and Najaf Mazari. They discuss the facts behind the…
We take a look at our five favourite links from around the internet this week.Keep the night-light on: Terrifying French picture booksSome believe we should tread cautiously with our children’s…
When Jeff Kinney created Diary of a Wimpy Kid, he thought he was telling stories for adults who like cartoons. Instead, the eccentric everyday comic adventures of middle-class middle child Greg…
Stella Rimington is the latest in a literary club that boasts the likes of Graeme Greene and John Le Carre as members: spooks turned spy novelists. Dubbed ‘housewife superspy’ when she was appointed …
Born to Libyan parents in New York, growing up between Tripoli and Cairo, Hisham Matar is perfectly placed to translate the tumult behind the Arab Spring to western readers. His perceptive…
Icelandic author Sjón is a rock ‘n’ roll renaissance man. He writes poetry, pens lyrics for Björk, wrote a whale-watching ‘splatter film’, and won the Nordic equivalent of the Man Booker for his…
Kathy Lette pioneered smart, funny fiction with a frivolous edge (and a feminist flavour). Her heroines find themselves in sticky situations that range from the outrageous to the outrageously…
Kathy Lette pioneered smart, funny fiction with a frivolous edge (and a feminist flavour). In 2012’s The Boy Who Fell to Earth, Lette’s character Lucy has more to manage than most: she’s trying to…
Who tells the story of a country? What story does a country’s national literature tell about its people and its identity? Is there such a thing as Australian literature at all? If there is, Hilary…
From Breaking Bad and The Wire to home-grown drug drama Underbelly, we couldn’t be more fascinated by the war against drugs. Walkley-award-winning investigative journalist Nick McKenzie has been to t…
No matter how compelling a novel or a film might be, if you have to study it, there’s always the risk you’ll end up hating it. Not any more! A gift to VCE students, their teachers (and of course…
Stella Rimington, former director-general of MI5, has been called Britain’s most famous spy. She’s also rumoured to be the inspiration for Judi Dench’s character M, in the James Bond franchise. But R…
What’s bigger news than the awarding of a major prize? The decision not to award a major prize. The literary world is agog with the news that the Pulitzer prize for fiction will not be awarded in…
Surreal, edgy and darkly comic, Etgar Keret has established his reputation as a major international talent. In Israel, he’s seen as a worthy successor to the Amos Oz generation with work that is as b…
Join us for a unique opportunity to share the company of two of the most inventive – and critically acclaimed – writers working in Spanish today, both of them award-winning novelists, translators…
Janette Turner Hospital, one of Australia’s most admired writers, speaks on a lifetime of writing – and teaching – literature.For almost three decades, Janette Turner Hospital’s award-winning…
Who are your favourite literary sleuths? Sherlock Holmes is a perennial favourite, but after that the field opens right up. The Guardian has come up with its top 10 literary sleuths. The list is…
Not all storytelling is about charming fables and whimsical yarns. This is an adults-only night of fantastical tales where anything goes. Four writers each write a short piece of filth about a…
Stuart Littlemore and PM Newton both have serious form, as a lawyer and police officer respectively. Now they’ve traded that for the world of fiction. Far from the glamorous world of private eyes…
Over two decades, Di Morrissey has gathered a legion of adoring fans and become an icon of the Australian publishing scene. This event, celebrating Di’s amazing career, coincides not only with the…
Alex Miller is the author of ten novels and one of Australia’s most cherished literary greats. To mark the publication of Autumn Laing, he talks about his life and work with critic Geordie…
In a Crikey report published earlier this week, Guy Rundle lamented the fall from grace of the Man Booker Prize. Rundle compared the prize’s first jury in 1969, consisting of the standard-bearers of …
The writerly trajectory of self-published 19-year-olds can be a thankless one, so when in 1996 every publishing house in Australia had rejected Matthew Reilly’s first novel, Contest, there was…
Jonathan Safran Foer is one of the most celebrated writers working in the English language today. Named among Granta’s Best Young American Writers and the New Yorker’s 20 Best Under 40, he’s one of t…
Ahead of She Kilda 2011 – the Australian Women Crime Writers’ Convention – the Wheeler Centre welcomed some of Australia’s leading crime writers. This criminally good panel discussed why there’s…
Much-loved North American novelist Anita Shreve’s latest novel, Rescue, is a masterful portrayal of a family trying to understand its own fractured past and begin again. In conversation with Jane…
Many of us have a favourite Big Issue vendor. Ours sits outside our local supermarket, is on speaking terms with all the locals, knows all the dogs' names and whether or not you can pat them, and…
Iconic Australian literature doesn’t come much more iconic than For the Term of His Natural Life, the quintessential convict tale. We remember its author: journalist, poet and novelist Marcus…
Imagine you are a publisher of serious literature and you receive a submission for a novel that goes something like this:“Cesar is a translator who’s fallen on very hard times due to the global…
This is a cross-post of a piece published on the blog ‘Alephantine’ by Alex Landragin.The ABC Radio National’s ‘Book Show’ yesterday broadcast a panel discussion called ‘The fact versus fiction…
The Monash Israel Oration is presented in partnership between the Wheeler Centre and Monash University’s Australian Centre for Jewish Civilisation, and under the auspices of the Leon Liberman Chair i…
(Click to watch video.) The Wheeler Centre recently hosted an event in our series, ‘The Late, Great…’, on Ruth Park. Today, as we publish the…
One of the greatest English novelists of the 20th century, author of such masterpieces as Brighton Rock, The Power and the Glory, The End of the Affair, The Third Man and The Quiet American, among…
(Click to watch video.) He’s written 24 novels and created two of crime and mystery fictions best-known contemporary heroes, Harry Bosch and Micky Haller…
In this edition of Texts in the City – the last with host Tony Wilson – writer and educator Tony Birch lends his knowledge of indigenous history to our understanding of Kate Grenville’s novel, The…
Screenshot from the trailer of Alfred Hitchcock’s Notorious [1946], via WikiCommons It’s Bloomsday. People all over the world – including Melbourne – are attending public r…
In the pantheon of contemporary crime writers, the name Michael Connelly is a perennial favourite. A former police reporter for the Los Angeles Times, Connelly has been thrilling readers since 1992 w…
Michael Cunningham is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Home at the End of the World, The Hours, Specimen Days and, most recently, By Nightfall. When The Hours was adapted for the screen to…
Michael Cunningham is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Home at the End of the World, The Hours, Specimen Days and, most recently, By Nightfall. A master of lyrical, compassionate and powerful p…
Sheet music of ‘Stars & Stripes Forever’ by John Philip Sousa, from the Library of Congress via WikiCommons The debate over Philip Roth’s legacy continues following his…
Acclaimed author David Mitchell is a writer’s writer. Bold, inventive, always surprising, he has quickly established a fanatical fan base and a reputation as a novelist to watch. Tackling and…
Image of c1880s stereo-optic view of Burmese pagodas via WikiCommons By Unpublished Manuscript Fellow Michelle Aung ThinFour years ago, I started writing my first novel…
Nine-metre bronze sculptures of Saddam Hussein in the grounds of the Republican Palace, Baghdad, 2005, by Kim Gordon, USDoD, via WikiCommons The comedian Sacha Baron-Cohen …
This year the University of Melbourne’s Janet Clarke Hall celebrates its 125th anniversary and will hold a series of events marking its heritage as Australia’s oldest residential college for women…
This year, from May 26 to June 5, Australia’s premiere celebration of aspiring and emerging writers is on again, with its trademark mix of support and advice, workshops and commiserations for those p…
Detail of Barack Obama’s long-form birth certificate, released last week There’s no body. The body was hastily dumped. The photos are too inflammatory to be released. He…
In her 2004 debut, How I Live Now, Meg Rosoff wrote about the impacts of war on children; about trauma and childhood sexuality, about resilience and suffering. Her extraordinary narrator…
(Click to watch video.) Politician, pensmith, (ex-) prisoner – there are many ‘P’ words that come to mind when Jeffrey Archer is in the house. Archer…
Indigenous Tasmanians on the margins of their own country, as painted by William Gould in River Scene with Aborigines, 1838, courtesy W. L. Crowther Library, Tasmanian Archive and…
Last week, we reported that Jennifer Egan had won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for her novel, A Visit from the Goon Squad. We also reported on the kerfuffle prompted by the announcement of the…
The death of David Foster Wallace in September 2008 was a loss for readers everywhere. Foster Wallace’s unique brand of literary pyrotechnics made the LA Times dub him ‘one of the most influential…
The winners of the 2011 Pulitzer Prize were announced overnight. The winner of the prize for fiction was Jennifer Egan’s A Visit from the Good Squad, a “an inventive investigation of growing up and g…
1871 illustration of a Russian grave-digger by Viktor Vasnetsov [1848-1926] from the Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, via WikiCommons The publication of David Foster Wallace’s…
The 38 tales of the Discworld, a strange yet strangely familiar world on the back of a giant turtle, have defied the limits of genre and attracted adoring fans around the world. Translated into 32…
In the fourth instalment of Texts in the City, Jenny Niven speaks to American Studies academic Glenn Moore about Barack Obama’s 1995 book Dreams from My Father.They discuss themes of race, identity a…
Award-winning Scottish novelist Andrew O’Hagan returns to Australia with his new book The Life and Opinions of Maf the Dog, and of His Friend Marilyn Monroe. O’Hagan discusses a life in writing…
Gretchen Rubin, author of The Happiness Project, has posted a blog of interest to fans of the great Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy. Anyone even slightly familiar with Tolstoy’s work would know that
Butterfly illustrations by Meyer via WikiCommons Vladimir Nabokov’s legions of fans know how infuriating their idol can be. Infuriatingly contrarian, infuriatingly
Image courtesy Wikicommons There’s hardly a book-lover in the world who isn’t familiar in one way or another with Sherlock Holmes. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s classic…
Author Paul Auster (image David Shankbone via wikicommons) As Paul Auster releases his new novel Sunset Park, Goodreads has published a rare interview with the American…
Australian-born, Dublin-based Monica McInerney is the author of the bestselling Those Faraday Girls, Family Baggage, The Alphabet Sisters, Spin the Bottle, Upside Down Inside Out and A Taste for It.S…
It was a wild night when Bret Easton Ellis came to Melbourne at the end of his tour for Imperial Bedrooms. At his most candid, BEE sets the record straight on Delta Goodrem, how Mad Men is better…
Peter Carey uses his latest book Parrot & Olivier in America to talk about literature, his writing process and how the snobbery of a French aristocrat might not be such a bad thing for our modern…
The legendary Irish writer tells of his last visit to Australia and how music can travel across oceans and time.
The legendary Irish writer tells of his last visit to Australia and how music can travel across oceans and time.
The author of Brooklyn discusses his latest novel, what it’s like to be the youngest child and why Irish charm can’t be trusted.
