Event and Ticketing Details
Dates & Times
Friday 09 April
6:30 PM - 7:30 PM
Few would disagree that in recent years the idea of the Anzac has become an important, even dominant force within Australian history. But with Anzac Day just around the corner, what does it all really mean?
In their new book What’s Wrong with Anzac? Professors Marilyn Lake and Henry Reynolds argue that Anzac has become a sacred, untouchable element of the nation.
A collection of thoughtful and provocative essays suggest that our Anzac obsession is distorting the rest of Australian history. But is this really the case?
At the special event, presented in partnership with The Australian Literary Review, a panel of historians and commentators explore the historical fact and the mythology surrounding Anzac.
Featuring What’s Wrong with Anzac? lead authors, Professors Marilyn Lake and Henry Reynolds and historian Ross McMullin. Chaired by the ALR’s Stephen Romei.
Featuring
Henry Reynolds
Henry Reynolds spent thirty years at James Cook University in Townsville. He wrote his first article on frontier conflict in 1972.Since then he has published more than twenty books, among them titles such as The Other Side of the Frontier (1981), The Law of the Land (1987), Why Weren’t We Told? (1999) and Forgotten War (2013).
View Profile
Marilyn Lake
Marilyn Lake is a leading Australian historian with a national and international profile. She has been researching the impact of war on Australian society for 30 years, the subject of both her MA and PhD thesis.
The latter won the Harbison-Higinbotham Prize awarded by the University of Melbourne for the best thesis on an Australian subject and was short-listed for the Age Book of the Year. She has continued to research war and society since that time.
Marilyn’s books have won a number of prizes most recently: Drawing the Global Colour Line: White Men’s Countries and the Question of Racial Equality (CUP/MUP) co-authored with Henry Reynolds won the Prime Minister’s Literary Award for Non-Fiction ( 2009), the Ernest Scott prize ( 2009)and the Queensland Premier’s prize for History ( 2008).
Her most recent book is as co-editor of What’s Wrong With Anzac? (2010), published by New South.
Ross McMullin
Ross McMullin is a historian and biographer whose main interests are Australian history, politics and sport. He has researched and written extensively about the impact on Australia of its involvement in World War I.
His books include the ALP centenary history The Light on the Hill: The Australian Labor Party 1891–1991, the award-winning biography Pompey Elliott, and So Monstrous a Travesty: Chris Watsonand the World’s First National Labour Government. He has also contributed chapters to many other books.
His most recent book is Will Dyson: Australia’s Radical Genius.