The Enigmatic Mr Deakin

Author: Judith Brett
Publisher: Text Publishing
ISBN: 1925410889
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 512

Book Description
Alfred Deakin—scholar, spiritualist, prime minister—was instrumental in creating modern Australia. In the first biography of Deakin in more than half a century, the acclaimed political historian Judith Brett deftly weaves together his public, private and family lives. She brings out from behind the image of a worthy, bearded father of federation the principled and passionate, gifted and eccentric figure whose legacy continues to shape the contours of the nation’s politics. Judith Brett is the award-winning author of Robert Menzies’ Forgotten People, emeritus professor of politics at La Trobe University and one of Australia’s leading political thinkers. She contributes regularly to the Monthly and has written three Quarterly Essays. ‘This is the first book to bring together the spiritual, political and personal life of one of Australia's most significant politicians – Alfred Deakin. As Brett deftly explores and weaves these strands together we begin to understand Alfred Deakin, his motivations and indeed his enigmatic qualities. This is a psychological study of Australia's former Prime Minister. Beginning with his Melburnian upbringing Brett shows how his social and familial context shaped him. The city of Melbourne of the period is revealed as crucial to how we are to comprehend and understand Deakin. Brett is a fine writer, and the text displays her curiosity and her depth of knowledge. This is a comprehensive work which will stand as a definitive source on Alfred Deakin.’ Prime Minister’s Literary Awards 2018, Judges’ comments ‘Truly one of the great political biographies of our time, a delicately nuanced, warm and insight account of—my personal misgiving aside—one of the most noteworthy political figures in Australian history.’ Inside Story ‘The Enigmatic Mr Deakin stands as the culmination of her work on the history, politics and philosophy of Australian liberals, and it is the one biography of Deakin to which we will repeatedly return. Brett’s writing is capable of extraordinary clarity, insight and compassion.’ Monthly ‘Judith Brett has proven the perfect biographer...’ Jason Steger on National Biography Award win, Sydney Morning Herald ‘A significant contribution to biography and political history that is beautifully written and full of interest.’ Royal Victorian Historical Society ‘Accessible and informative, this style of biography layers facts over questions that draw in readers curious about what makes human beings do the things we do. This is biography for our times.’ Daily Review ‘The Enigmatic Mr Deakin explores our second prime minister’s career with full attention to his intense inner life and family relationships. Her title points to the puzzles, but Brett doesn’t simplify; she ponders, suggests, dramatises. Closely observed and psychologically persuasive, this is more than a life-and-times; it is a life.’ Australian Book Review ‘This excellent biography will appeal to general readers, students and anyone interested in historical biography.’ Books+Publishing ‘A woman’s eye on a powerful man has never felt so penetrating, perceptive and, surprisingly, loving.’ Clare Wright, Sydney Morning Herald’s Year in Reading ‘Alfred Deakin, long my favourite Victorian, was truly the full package: polymath, progressive, idealist, spiritualist, man of action. And he had a fantastic beard. All he lacked was a good biography—but not anymore.’ Saturday Paper, Best Books of 2017 ‘In this engrossing and quietly profound biography, Judith Brett brings Deakin back into Australia’s contemporary political imagination, so we can better understand how he shaped the country we live in today...In this age of increasingly polarised politics, Brett’s book is at once a warm portrait of a great politician and a sharp provocation to today’s leaders to forge a better way.’ John Daley, CEO Grattan Institute, Prime Minister’s Summer Reading List 2017 A richly rewarding excursion into the private mind and emotions but also into the public life and times of a remarkable individual, full of surprising detail and profound observations about the Australian polity...Among the very best political biographies written in Australia.’ Judges’ Comments, National Biography Award, 2018

From Secret Ballot to Democracy Sausage

Author: Judith Brett
Publisher: Text Publishing
ISBN: 1925626814
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 208

Book Description
It’s compulsory to vote in Australia. We are one of a handful of countries in the world that enforce this rule at election time, and the only English-speaking country that makes its citizens vote. Not only that, we embrace it. We celebrate compulsory voting with barbeques and cake stalls at polling stations, and election parties that spill over into Sunday morning. But how did this come to be: when and why was voting in Australia made compulsory? How has this affected our politics? And how else is the way we vote different from other democracies? Lively and inspiring, From Secret Ballot to Democracy Sausage is a landmark account of the character of Australian democracy by the celebrated historian Judith Brett, the prize-winning biographer of Alfred Deakin.

Doing Politics

Author: Judith Brett
Publisher: Text Publishing
ISBN: 1922330981
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 319

Book Description
A brilliant collection of the best essays by award-winning writer Judith Brett, long revered by those in the know as Australia’s brightest and most astute political commentator.

Vera Deakin and the Red Cross

Author: Carole Woods
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781875173105
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
This is a biography of Vera Deakin, daughter of the Prime Minister Alfred Deakin, focussing on her work with the Australian Red Cross. At the outbreak of war she gave up her musical studies to initiate the Wounded and Missing Inquiry Bureau of the Red Cross in Cairo and later in London. After the War she championed the needs of limbless veterans. During the Second World War Vera undertook similar work in Melbourne for the Red Cross. She was also involved in other Melbourne charities and welfare bodies, including the Children's hospital and Yooralla.

Quarterly Essay 78 The Coal Curse

Author: Judith Brett
Publisher: Black Inc.
ISBN: 1743821360
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 163

Book Description
Australia is a wealthy nation with the economic profile of a developing country – heavy on raw materials, and low on innovation and skilled manufacturing. Once we rode on the sheep’s back for our overseas trade; today we rely on cartloads of coal and tankers of LNG. So must we double down on fossil fuels, now that COVID-19 has halted the flow of international students and tourists? Or is there a better way forward, which supports renewable energy and local manufacturing? Judith Brett traces the unusual history of Australia’s economy and the “resource curse” that has shaped our politics. She shows how the mining industry learnt to run fear campaigns, and how the Coalition became dominated by fossil-fuel interests to the exclusion of other voices. In this insightful essay about leadership, vision and history, she looks at the costs of Australia’s coal addiction and asks, where will we be if the world stops buying it? “Faced with the crisis of a global pandemic, for the first time in more than a decade Australia has had evidence-based, bipartisan policy-making. Politicians have listened to the scientists and ... put ideology and the protection of vested interests aside and behaved like adults. Can they do the same to commit to fast and effective action to try to save our children’s and grandchildren’s future, to prevent the catastrophic fires and heatwaves the scientists predict, the species extinction and the famines?” —Judith Brett, The Coal Curse

Best We Forget

Author: Peter Cochrane
Publisher: Text Publishing
ISBN: 1925626733
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 267

Book Description
The preparation for a coming war and ultimately the commitment to that war was driven by White Australia's sense of vulnerability in the Pacific, by various nightmare scenarios in which Australia could be left to fend for itself, unaided by Britain, and by the determination to have racial purity at almost any cost. When the war came, finally, the strategy was simple enough: by promising total support the Australians hoped to secure Britain's unequivocal support in return, for a White Australia. They hoped they would not be forsaken. Dr. Peter Cochrane is a writer of non-fiction, fiction, opinion and travel. His works have won many awards including the Fellowship of Australian Writers' Award for Non-Fiction (1993) for Simpson and the Donkey. He also won the Age Book of the Year and the Prime Minister's Prize for Australian History in 2007 for Colonial Ambition. He lives in Sydney. ‘This careful, detailed account...establishes that an important motive for our participation [in World War I] was the preservation of white Australia from Asian contamination.’ Age ‘A great read, and an important contribution to making forgotten history more accessible—the kind of book that will seep into the national consciousness over time.’ Tim Watts, federal MP and co-author of Two Futures ‘The words “White Australia” and “Anzac" rarely keep company. In this brilliant and provocative reassessment, Peter Cochrane strips away the layers of myth to show that for Australian leaders World War I was a white racial struggle, with fear of Japan and distrust of Britain, as much as loathing of Germany, at its heart. After Best We Forget, Australia’s war should never look quite the same again.’ Frank Bongiorno, professor of history at the ANU and author of The Eighties ‘Revelatory history at its best. Every Australian politician, journalist and high-school student should read this fluent and compelling story that exhumes an unpalatable truth about our motives for going to war in 1914, and reflect on what it tells us about race fear and the value of history.’ Stephen FitzGerald, chairman of China Matters, former diplomat and author of Comrade Ambassador ‘Cochrane sweeps away the myth to expose the uncomfortable racial truth at the heart of Anzac.’ Paul Daley, award-winning journalist and author of Beersheba ‘Unsettling and revelatory...The primary purpose of Cochrane’s fascinating book is to alert readers to the racial dimension of Australia’s participation in World War I. It also addresses the key historiographical question of what is remembered and what is forgotten, and why...He has succeeded admirably in this illuminating book...Illuminating.’ Australian ‘Best We Forget is, quite simply, the most important book on Australia and the Great War to appear in the course of the war’s centenary...Cochrane has made the original and profound connection between Australian racial fears and its participation in the Great War. This is something that—amazingly—no one else has done...Cochrane’s is a most original and illuminating argument.’ Peter Stanley, Honest History

Sold Down the River

Author: Scott Hamilton
Publisher: Text Publishing
ISBN: 1922459453
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 324

Book Description
Two insiders expose the shocking and shameful betrayal of Australia’s regional heartland so international bankers and traders could make a quick buck.

Where the Truth Lies

Author: Karina Kilmore
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 192568587X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 352

Book Description
She was slipping away. The further she fell, the closer the clouds seemed to come. Wispy transparent slipstreams of white. Cirrus. Pain smashed her head. Floating … When investigative journalist Chrissie O’Brian lands a senior job at The Argus, she is desperate to escape the nightmares of her past. Her life has become a daily battle to numb the pain. But her job is something she can do better than anyone else – and the only thing that keeps the memories at bay. A face-off on the waterfront between the unions and big business is just the kind of story to get her career back on track. But after a dockworker who confided in her turns up dead, Chrissie becomes obsessed with unravelling the truth. When a gruesome threat lands on her desk, it's clear someone is prepared to do anything to stop her. But who is more dangerous – a ruthless enemy or a woman pushed to the edge? Used to fighting her own demons, this is one battle Chrissie is determined not to lose. Where the Truth Lies was a 2020 Ned Kelly Award finalist for best debut. It was shortlisted for the prestigious Unpublished Manuscript Award in the 2017 Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards, the same award Jane Harper won for The Dry. Shortlisted for the 2021 Ngaio Marsh Awards – Best First Novel. ‘A complex and compelling debut that’s impossible to put down!’ CHRISTIAN WHITE, bestselling author of The Nowhere Child, The Wife and the Widow 'A clever, explosive thriller ... I love Kilmore’s flawed heroine’s feistiness and her determination to take on the old boys’ network. Truly impressive' PETRONELLA MCGOVERN, bestselling author of Six Minutes ‘Kilmore holds an unflinching mirror up to Melbourne’s darker side in this gritty tale full of twists, packed with compelling characters. An exciting new voice in Australian crime fiction’ JANE HARPER, bestselling author of The Dry, Force of Nature, The Lost Man ‘A gripping and gritty novel introducing a heroine who’s just as layered and complex’ Who magazine ‘The breakout hit of the year’ Woman’s Day ‘Chrissie’s desperate race to uncover the truth will have you hooked’ Herald Sun ‘Excellent Aussie crime, with polished writing, great structure, compelling characters and a vivid Melbourne setting. There is a lot of buzz around this book and rightly so. It’s a fantastic read and definitely one you need to get your hands on immediately’ Better Reading ‘Journalist Karina Kilmore brings a wealth of insider knowledge to this explosive crime thriller.’ Australian Women’s Weekly 'It’s easy to see why everyone’s talking about this debut novel.’ Newtown Review of Books ‘Reading this reminded me of Sara Peretsky’s first books … there’s every chance we’re seeing the beginning of a substantial antipodean series that will inform and analyse while it entertains’ The Australian

Elizabeth Macarthur

Author: Michelle Scott Tucker
Publisher: Text Publishing
ISBN: 1925626466
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 384

Book Description
‘An intimate portrait of a woman who changed herself and Australia...Michelle Scott Tucker makes Elizabeth Macarthur step off the page.’ David Hunt , Author of Girt In 1788 a young gentlewoman raised in the vicarage of an English village married a handsome, haughty and penniless army officer. In any Austen novel that would be the end of the story, but for the real-life woman who became an Australian farming entrepreneur, it was just the beginning. John Macarthur took credit for establishing the Australian wool industry and would feature on the two-dollar note, but it was practical Elizabeth who managed their holdings—while dealing with the results of John’s manias: duels, quarrels, court cases, a military coup, long absences overseas, grandiose construction projects and, finally, his descent into certified insanity. Michelle Scott Tucker shines a light on an often-overlooked aspect of Australia’s history in this fascinating story of a remarkable woman. Michelle Scott Tucker owns and operates a management consulting company, and lives on a small farm in regional Victoria with her husband and children. Elizabeth Macarthur is her first book. ‘Tucker’s great achievement is to have scraped back the familiar historical material to uncover a fresh and compelling portrait of Elizabeth Macarthur in her own words and the words of those who knew her.’ Australian ‘In writing this lively, entertaining and profoundly empathetic biography, [Tucker] has also brought other colonial women out of the shaows and told their story too...There are not many biographies or histories of Australia that are unputdownable, but this one is. Highly recommended!’ ANZ LitLovers 'The triumphs and trials of Elizabeth Macarthur, a capable business woman and dedicated wife and mother, are given their due in this impressively researched biography.’ Brenda Niall ‘This carefully researched history is a highly interesting read that highlights the importance of women in the settlement of New South Wales.’ Otago Daily Times 'Finally, Elizabeth Macarthur steps out from the long shadow of her infamous, entrepreneurial husband. In Michelle Scott Tucker’s devoted hands, Elizabeth emerges as a canny businesswoman, charming diplomat, loving mother and indefatigable survivor. A fascinating, faithful portrait of a remarkable woman and the young, volatile colony she helped to build.’ Clare Wright ‘A nourishing, fascinating, and eye-opening read.’ Alpha Reader ‘Tucker expertly details the trials, tragedies and triumphs of the early settlement of NSW...This book is an important historical memoir documenting the incredible life of an Australian pioneer and her role as the matriarch of one of Australia’s first agricultural dynasties.’ Countryman ‘Elizabeth Macarthur: A Life at the Edge of the World is a great read. It crafts a compulsive story with good research, giving a convincing look into colonial New South Wales. It offers the pleasures of fine biography in tracing one person’s life in all its seasons, through its successes and failures, joys and miseries.’ NathanHobby blog ‘A stunning and intimate look at Elizabeth [Macarthur] and the family’s lives...Should be required reading in schools...An informative and learned look at colonial history.’ AU Review

Connected Empires, Connected Worlds

Author: Robert S.G. Fletcher
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000596591
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 305

Book Description
Connected Empires, Connected Worlds: Essays in Honour of John Darwin contains diverse essays on the expansion, experience, and decline of empires. The volume is offered in honour of John Darwin’s contribution to the study of empire and its endings. Written by his former students and colleagues, the book’s chapters discuss topics from the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first centuries. While each author has contributed according to their expertise, they also reflect on how John’s ideas and approaches continue to stimulate new work in disparate fields. Touching on the experience of empire in Europe, Africa, Asia and Australasia, the authors have engaged with concepts from across Darwin’s writings, including his earlier work on decolonisation, ‘decline’, and ‘the dynamics of territorial expansion’. As such, the work in this volume operates across a number of different scales of analysis: from case studies of transnational communities, state formation and military intervention, to imperial politics, inter-imperial comparison, and global historical frameworks. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History.