The Godfather: Peter Corris on accents
All four of my grandparents spoke with regional British accents – Manx, north-country English and Scots. My parents spoke with mid-range Australian accents, neither – to use examples from the period – broad like the Labor leader Arthur Calwell, nor posh like the prime...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on voting
For the first time in my life I have been threatened with a fine for not voting in an election. This has caused me a little shame. I had to wait until I was 21 to vote (the voting age was not lowered to 18 until 1974), but ever since I’ve voted enthusiastically in...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on our changing language
Language has to change, to absorb new influences, if it is to retain its vigour. Typically, a dominant culture will have a profound effect, impacting on the subordinate society as with Norman French on Anglo-Saxon English, but it’s a two-way process – think of Hindi...
BERNARD COHEN The Antibiography of Robert F Menzies. Reviewed by Michael Richardson
Robert Menzies, John Howard, the dreams and delusions of Australian politics – all resonate in this satirical and inventive novel. Typically, reviews begin with a snippet from the book in question or with a short description of the work and its main concerns. In form...
DAVID MALOUF A First Place. Reviewed by Kathy Gollan
David Malouf’s absorbing essays, full of erudition and with his trademark lucid prose, engage with the troubled issue of Australian identity. In this fascinating collection of essays, written between 1984 and 2010, David Malouf circles around that Australian...ROBERT HARRIS An Officer and a Spy. Reviewed by Peter Corris
The Dreyfus Case, notorious for its betrayals and anti-Semitism, inspires this new thriller from the author of Fatherland. In the Acknowledgments to his new novel Robert Harris thanks his wife: … who has been obliged to share our house with successive waves of Nazis,...The Godfather: Peter Corris on elections
The first Federal election I remember was in 1960. It was the one Robert Menzies won by one seat – the ‘Killen, you are magnificent’ election.* I couldn’t vote, being only 18 (the voting age for Federal elections was not lowered from 21 to 18 until 1973) but my...Peter Corris nominates his best books of 2012
The NRB editors have invited me to nominate the best books I’ve read in 2012. As I explained in a Godfather column earlier this year (NRB 31 June), I keep a list of books I’ve read, with a brief assessment, and I assign each book a mark out of ten. This...
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