Culture

  • Art arises from the mud

    MELBOURNE — In a city where arts festivals seem to run continuously, a bit of controversy helps to ensure that yours won't go unnoticed. The 5th Melbourne Uni Arts Festival, MUDfest (July 30-August 17), is in this enviable

  • Journey of emotions

    Review by Lynda Hansen BRISBANE — Women in Voice was instigated in 1993 by Annie Deller-Peterson. This performance, Women in Voice 7, on July 20, featured Barb Fordham, Jeannie Lewis, Leah Cotterell, Bronwyn Calcutt, Katrina Alberts and Alison

  • Dangerous masculinities

    The John Wayne PrincipleWritten by Tony McNamaraDirected by David BertholdSydney Theatre Company, Wharf 1, from July 23and Melbourne from September 8 Review by Mark Stoyich There are currently two portrayals of fucked-up masculinity showing in

  • Rap and the politics of sexism

    The 1995 Million Man March, initiated by black nationalist leader Louis Farrakhan, which promoted the need for black men to take responsibility for their lives and families, left many, including black leader Angela Davis,

  • The rich legacy of a US revolutionary

    Building the Revolutionary Party: An introduction to James P. CannonNew Course Publications, 1997100pp., $7.95 Review by Pip Hinman Full-time revolutionaries are mostly stereotyped as being narrow and dogmatic. But to read anything of James P.

  • Passionate and intriguing lives

    Vita and VirginiaWritten by Eileen Atkins, directed by Richard CottrellWith Ruth Cracknell and Jennifer HaganSydney Theatre CompanyThe Playhouse, Sydney Opera House from July 26 Vita Sackville-West and Virginia Woolf, two of England's most intriguing

  • Spring Writing Festival

    Spring Writing Festival SYDNEY — A diversity of Australian and overseas writers will attend the 5th Annual Spring Writing Festival on September 13-14 at the Rozelle Hospital heritage gardens. Presented by the NSW Writers Centre, the program

  • Signs of life in reggae

    Reggae WrapVarious artistsIrie NegrilHurricane ReliefVarious artistsVermont Reggae FestivalLead With the Bass II and All the World in an EggVarious artistsUniversal Egg Records Reviews by Norm Dixon Any fan of political reggae will tell you that

  • popo's dream

    popo's dream Can a dream ruin your life?One that begins like a train rideWith you stepping off the platformIn your travelling clothes, a vagrant,the fabric, a story, in which youwander 'til wearied, and far off ...The wheels turning, far off a

  • Witty demolition of a right-wing smear job

    Suspect History: Manning Clark and the Future of Australia's PastBy Humphrey McQueenWakefield Press, 1997238 pp., $17.95(pb) Review by Phil Shannon Australia's history, if a certain resident of Kirribilli House is to be believed, has been one of

  • Time to wake up satire

    Rather than wring his hands and lament that political satire seemed to be in its dog days, Dave Riley decided to do something about it. "Good satire", he told Green Left Weekly, "is rare. It rages for a time, then rests. It's time

  • A powerful modern-day Dreaming

    Review by Emily Carr How do the leading lights of Australia's indigenous arts community respond to a year which has brought an ugly concoction of the most conservative political forces in decades? Stephen Page, artistic director and compere of