Hear what poet and critic Sarah Holland-Batt has to say about Australia's as-yet-uncrowned Poet Laureate. She takes a close look at the tradition to explores poetry's relationship to power in order to highlight the potential pitfalls as well as the possible benefits of such a figure.

Can a poet laureate bring poetry back in Australia, where it's long been an afterthought for cultural policymakers? How might such a person engage our politics? And can we (shall we?) build the infrastructure to support poetic careers—not just poetic moments?

And, most urgently, how long will it take before someone dubs the be-laureled bard Australia's Poet Lorikeet?

Further reading

For the written version of this address, see The Poet in the Public Arena by Sarah Holland-Batt, published in Sydney Review of Books.

To learn more about her work, visit Sarah Holland-Batt.

CREDITS

Fully Lit is brought to you by UTS Impact Studios, the Sydney Review of Books and the UTS Writing and Publishing Program.

Executive producers, Sarah Gilbert and James Jiang.

Producer Regina Botros.

This special edition of Fully Lit Live was recorded at the Abercrombie Hotel in Sydney, on beautiful Gadigal land.

It was a night of celebration, conversation, and creative sparks, as we launched the podcast with a vibrant discussion on the power of audio as a medium for literary criticism - one where the critique is embodied, voiced and felt, and built in conversation with one another and with you, our listeners, in mind.

Sophie Gee of the Secret Life of Books was there to host a conversation with Lynda Ng and Ben Etherington, then Delia Falconer, of the UTS Writing and Publishing Program, introduced our friendly crowd to Eda Gunaydin, the 2025 UTS-Copyright Agency writer in residence.

Then we ate cake!

Further reading

Eda Gunaydin is the author of Root and Branch (2022, New South), a collection of essays. You can read many of her published essays via her website.

You can find Eileen Chong's poem, 'We Speak of Flowers,' about launching a book here, thanks to Kill Your Darlings.

Credits

This live event was recorded by Simon Branthwaite, who also did sound design on this episode.

Fully Lit is an Impact Studios podcast, made in collaboration with the Sydney Review of Books.

Its producer is Regina Botros.

Executive producers are Sarah Gilbert and James Jiang.

On this episode Teela Reid and Merinda Dutton, the co-founders of Blackfulla Bookclub, talk about the online community they’ve built around First Nations storytelling and discuss their experiences of reading Fire Front, an anthology of poetry and essays curated by Alison Whittaker. It’s about seeing, and hearing, and reading the world through powerful First Nations perspectives. Listen up.

We are republishing this episode from the Sydney Review of Books' very first podcast season, to mark this month's NAIDOC week celebrations.

* Please note that this episode contains names and references to deceased persons*

You can find Blackfulla Bookclub on Instagram @blackfulla_bookclub

Merinda Dutton is on Twitter and Instagram @min_dutton

Teela Reid is on Twitter and Instagram @teelareid

Fire Front: First Nations poetry And Power Today was curated by Alison Whittaker and published by UQP.

We acknowledge the traditional custodians of the lands on which we work, the Burramattagal people of the Darug nation and the Gadigal people of the Eora nation We pay our respects to elders past, present, and emerging. Sovereignty was never ceded, and the struggles for justice are ongoing. We acknowledge the traditional custodians of the lands this digital platform reaches.

Fully Lit is brought to you by UTS Impact Studios, the Sydney Review of Books and the UTS Writing and Publishing Program.