With Louise Adler & Amanda Vanstone. Claudia Roden was scheduled for livestream but was unable to stream in for the session. A conversation between Claudia and Amanda was later recorded and will be available soon.

More than 50 years ago, Claudia Roden’s A Book of Middle Eastern Food introduced the flavours of the Middle East to western readers. Long before Ottolenghi, she introduced homecooks around the world to the delights of cumin and coriander from Egypt, sumac and tamarind from Syria and Lebanon, pomegranates from Iran and harissa from Africa. Claudia Roden CBE talks about flavours and cooking at home with the Hon Amanda Vanstone AO, owner of over 500 cookbooks and a whiz with braised duck and turnips.

Event details: Mon 06 Mar, 9:30am on the West Stage

Chair: Monica Attard

As the war in Ukraine drags on, cities are destroyed and people’s lives are devastated, how do we make sense of Russia and the rationale behind its ’special military operation’? There has been intense focus on the plight of Ukraine’s citizenry, but less attention has been paid to the Russian mindset, the historical context for this invasion and the likely consequences. Former ABC foreign correspondent Monica Attard is joined by political scientist Anatol Lieven, historian Sheila Fitzpatrick and Belarusian writer Alhierd Bacharevič.

Event details: Mon 06 Mar, 5:00pm on the East Stage

Once upon a time the publishing mantra was that books about politics only sell if written by progressives. The past decade has proven that truism wrong. But what makes for a good book about contemporary politics? Is it scandal? Revelation? Good writing? Laura Tingle and John Warhurst (with Laurie Oakes) spent much of the past 12 months reading as judges of the inaugural Australian Political Book of the Year. So, what did they conclude?

Event details: Mon 06 Mar, 3:45pm on the East Stage

Chair: Anne Summers

Hilary McPhee, together with her business partner Di Gribble, established Australia’s first woman-owned publishing house in 1975. For over two decades, McPhee discovered new writers who are now revered as greats of the Australian literary canon, including Helen Garner, Tim Winton and Drusilla Modjeska. Monkey Grip, Puberty Blues and Cloudstreet are just some of the books this Grand Dame of Australian letters nurtured into being. In this insightful conversation, McPhee talks about those halcyon days, her friend the late Carmen Callil and the state of modern publishing.

Event details: Mon 06 Mar, 2:30pm on the East Stage

Chair: Jon Faine

“No matter what arguments I’d advance, I’d be the loser and murdered." The credo of Benzion Netanyahu in Joshua Cohen’s novel The Netanyahus encapsulates the cost of winning and of losing. Novelist Joshua Cohen and psychoanalyst Josh Cohen discuss the haunting figure of the loser in literature, politics and psychoanalysis.

Event details: Mon 06 Mar, 1:15pm on the East Stage

Chair: Claire Nichols

James Joyce in Ulysses wrote: “Every life is many days, day after day. We walk through ourselves, meeting robbers, ghosts, giants, old men, young men, wives, widows, brothers-in-love, but always meeting ourselves.“ John Boyne, Esther Freud and Louise Kennedy examine the Irish soul.

Supported by Culture Ireland.

Event details: Mon 06 Mar, 12:00pm on the East Stage

Chair: Bob Carr

Sir David Hare, one of the greatest British playwrights of our time, explores his anxiety that our world has sped up and that history in this century is a dizzying, unpredictable and unsettling succession of events. Hare has always imbued the political with the personal, exposed the aphrodisiac of power and the creative energy of anger. His latest book, We Travelled: Essays and Poems, continues his life’s work of arguing against economic rationalism and the bankers, politicians, plutocrats and churchmen who profit from it.

Event details: Mon 06 Mar, 10:45am on the East Stage

Chair: Catriona Menzies-Pike

According to one critic: “Biography is a very definite region bounded on the north by history, on the south by fiction, on the east by obituary and on the west by tedium." Is there truth in this statement? Catriona Menzies-Pike chairs an expansive discussion with award-winning biographers Bernadette Brennan, Brigitta Olubas, Sean O’Beirne, Heather Clark and Samantha Rose Hill.

Event details: Mon 06 Mar, 9:30am on the East Stage

Chair: Sarah Ayoub

In Runt, Craig Silvey has written a book for the whole family – and for all the dog lovers out there! A touching and heart-warming tale in the tradition of Charlotte’s Web and Babe, Silvey’s book centres on the relationship between a stray dog with a special talent and his adopted owner. In conversation with Sarah Ayoub, Silvey gives an insight into the impetus for this “hilarious tale of kindness, friendship, hurdles, hoops, tunnels, see-saws, being yourself and bringing out the best in others".

Event details: Sun 05 Mar, 3:00pm in the Torres Tent

Chair: Clare Sawyer

Jared Thomas goes straight to the heart with his powerful new YA novel, My Spare Heart. The story centres on 17-year-old Phoebe, whose life is turned upside down when she relocates to the country with her dad, deepening the connection to her Indigenous culture. As she juggles the normal pressures of a busy teenage life, Phoebe must also navigate a tricky relationship with her unreliable mother. In this session, Thomas reflects on this uplifting story and the lessons to be found from his own life.

Event details: Sun 05 Mar, 2:00pm in the Torrens Tent