Spring 2025

by Esther Anatolitis (Editor), Marion Kickett (Contributor), Amy Remeikis (Contributor)

How robust is Australian democracy? Fifty years ago, an elected government was abruptly dismissed by a governor-general whose reasons, methods and secret correspondences have never been made clear to the Australian public. This season we turn to the cultural and political impactsof 11 November 1975 that continue to shape contemporary Australia. Tom McIlroy speaks to the remaining living journalists who covered the event. Njamal man and Indigenous jurisprudence scholar Tyson Holloway-Clark looks at Pine Gap – the joint Australia-US military base placed on nuclear alert during Whitlam’s prime ministership without him or the Australian Government being informed – from a First Nations perspective. Virginia Haussegger tracks fifty years of political misogyny since the Whitlam Government appointed the world’s first Women’s Adviser to a national government and introduced Australia’s first Racial Discrimiation Act. Ben Eltham assess Whitlam’s arts and cultural legacy. Constitutional expert Anne Twomey touches on some of the constitutional sleepers that that threaten to undermine our democracy if tested. Compelling reading alongside fine poetry, fiction, memoir and review pieces makes this an historic edition of Australia’s leading literary journal that no Meanjin collection can be without. Embrace Australia’s finest  Meanjin 84.3 Spring 2025 out Wednesday 17 September.

291 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 16, 2025

Reviews

[Jennifer (JC-S) · Rating 4 out of 5]

'This season we turn to the cultural and political impacts of 11 November 1975 that continue to shape contemporary Australia.'

I do not always read Meanjin from cover to cover, but I did this time. For two reasons: the contents were focussed on the events of 1975 when, on 11 November, an elected government was abruptly dismissed by the governor-general. I remember the day well.

But aside from revisiting 1975, I was horrified to read that this is to be the second last edition of Meanjin:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/202...

A travesty indeed.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith