'I want to begin by acknowledging that I am meeting with you from the land of the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung people of the Kulin Nation, and pay my respect to their Elders, past and present. Also, I pay respect to all First Nations people and their descendants who are with us today. I acknowledge my accountability and unwavering allyship for First Nations people seeking justice for all historical and systemic wrongs they have incurred since invasion.' (Introduction)
'Solace is a small collection given it has been winnowed from close to forty years of work. This either implies that Graham Henderson has not written many poems or that the selection has been extremely judicious.' (Introduction)
'My review of this dazzling book has been delayed by my father’s recent death. But the greatest tribute I can give to Anne Casey is to say that reviewing her work has been one of my greatest consolations in the past several weeks. I find myself rereading the poems in this collection several times a day, like a devout person telling their prayer beads. This analogy feels like a natural one: the poems as a whole speak of faith, in human capacity for joy and connection, a reaching for what affirms life, expressed in longing for those things we have lost, and fear losing forever, during the ordeal we are all experiencing as we navigate the enforced separations and prolonged anxieties induced by the ongoing pandemic.' (Introduction)
'Richard James Allen is a widely published and prize winning author, as well as being a multi-talented artist excelling in many art-forms. Allen describes himself as a poet, dancer, film director, actor, novelist and choreographer. His latest novel More Lies contains 33 chapters, each chapter no longer than one and a half pages, it is a small book but what it contains is a treasure of laughs and lies.' (Introduction)
'A sense of anticipation stirs. I sit with a large archive box marked ‘Vallis’ at a wide wooden desk in the University of Queensland’s Fryer Library. Other boxes await. I lift the box’s lid.' (Introduction)
