The material on this page is available to AustLit subscribers. If you are a subscriber or are from a subscribing organisation, please log in to gain full access. To explore options for subscribing to this unique teaching, research, and publishing resource for Australian culture and storytelling, please contact us or find out more.
'Second wave feminism shines a long beam still on the question of abortion. Wherever young feminists and other activists sit vis a vis arguments about the ‘assignment’ of sex and gender at birth, both something of the passion born specifically of women’s connection to abortion, and second wave feminism’s modern raising of abortion to the status of a woman’s right, seem to have fuelled the recent demonstrations and massive outpourings around Roe v Wade.' (Alison Caddick, Editorial introduction)
Contents
* Contents derived from the 2022 version. Please note that other versions/publications may contain different contents. See the Publication Details.
Firei"nothing is as final as fire",Edith Speers,
single work poetry
(p. 31)
Lighti"Look at the light upon the Earth—",Edith Speers,
single work poetry
(p. 31)
'My father has been dead for fifty years. He was going on for seventy-two, and had been doing, on that Friday in late October 1971, what he had done for most of his life: labouring in a tannery. As usual on Friday nights, he brought home fish-and-chips and a bottle of Fourex, to fall asleep in front of the television. My mother could not wake him.'
(Introduction)
(p. 75-80)
Techi"I remember the old man",John Falzon,
single work poetry
(p. 81-82)
'In January 2022 I performed my three one-woman pieces—whitenoise: 12 ghosts—over three nights at Theatre Works Mullet Festival. Each piece focused on a different form of violence: Laying Down the Law looked at the gendered violence of the Lindy Chamberlain case; What Happened Was This was the story of LebaneseAustralian Mamdouh Habib, his kidnapping, imprisonment and torture; Credibility Gulf, the third, focused on the first Gulf War. These were significant and iconic moments that have settled deep into our collective memories and cultural/political unconscious. I wanted to put the bodies and stories back together, reassemble them differently to create a new, more human, empathetic, and politically aware re-assessment of what really happened. I wanted whitenoise to re-contextualise these events, allowing the audience to re-member and re-appraise their impact: to activate an awareness of why re-engagement with these iconic events and characters—their ghosts—is necessary. I hoped to give the audience some conceptual and creative tools to extrapolate to similar events, including those taking place today.' (Introduction)
