Curator Dr Grace Blakeley-Carroll looks at the experiences of early twentieth-century Australian female writers Henry Handel Richardson, Miles Franklin and Christina Stead and the publishing industry, as revealed through a new display in the Treasures Gallery.

Emeritus Professor Lesley Johnson explores the history of institutions that have shaped the humanities, and how complex forces continue to create uncertainty about their value today.

The industrial innovation of chilling or freezing perishable produce transformed relationships between climates and the production and consumption of food across the globe. This talk considers how refrigeration was adapted to open up new trades, notably in meat, dairy and fruit, between Australia and the Pacific Islands from the late nineteenth century. Refrigeration also had profound effects on livelihoods, cultural practices and regional relations, creating legacies that continue to shape the Pacific to this day.

Dr Frances Steel is a senior lecturer in History at the University of Wollongong and specialises in histories of empire and mobility in the Pacific.

Dr Steel is the National Library Fellow supported by Deidre McCann and Kevin McCann AM and the Macquarie Group Foundation.

The map Archipelagus Orientalis, sive Asiaticus (Eastern or Asian Archipelago) is a historical goldmine; it records the first sighting of Tasmania and the first mapping of the New Zealand coast by Europeans. It became the template for all subsequent maps of 'New Holland', or Australia. After being acquired by the Library in 2013 and displayed in the exhibition Mapping Our World: Terra Incognita to Australia, the map underwent intense restoration. Now, after four years of conservation work, see for yourself the amazing results. Martin Woods, Curator of Maps, and Libby Melzer, conservator at the Grimwade Centre, will explain the restoration journey as it returns to display in our Treasures Gallery for a limited time only.

A Treasures Gallery Access Program, supported by National Library Patrons

Novelist Kim Scott reveals how reclaiming Aboriginal language and story may offer a narrative of shared history and contribute to social transformation.

The Ray Mathew Lecture was established in 2009 as a major annual event for the National Library of Australia. It is named in honour of the Australian poet and playwright, Ray Mathew (1929–2002), who left Australia in the late 1960s, never to return. Mathew spent most of the remainder of his life living in the New York apartment of his patrons, Eva and Paul Kollsman. The Ray Mathew and Eva Kollsman Trust is a generous bequest, made to the Library by Eva Kollsman, to support and promote Australian writing.

Unbreakable is the story of Jelena Dokic’s survival, in her own words. How she survived as a refugee, twice. How she survived on the tennis court to become world No. 4. But, most importantly, how she survived her domineering coach and father, Damir Dokic.

From war-torn Yugoslavia to Sydney and, later, Wimbledon, Jelena Dokic narrates her hellish ascent to international tennis stardom and her heart-breaking fall from the top.

In association with Penguin Random House

On retiring from the Art Gallery of New South Wales in 1971, Director Hal Missingham received an extraordinary gift: a bound volume containing contributions from over 200 Australian artists and cultural figures. Join Treasures Curator Nat Williams, Hal’s son Peter Missingham and publisher and curator Lou Klepac to explore this fascinating volume and celebrate the production of the new Beagle Press book Hal Missingham: Artist Author Photographer.

A Treasures Gallery Access Program, supported by National Library Patrons

Image: Russell Drysdale (1912–1981), The Waitress, For Hal., from Fully Bound: Over to Hal Missingham: A Tribute with Love and Affection, 1971, nla.cat-vn4598533

In this creative presentation, Timothy Daly and actors will show how dormant historical material is turned into viable and exciting contemporary theatre.

Timothy Daly is one of Australia’s most internationally-produced playwrights with a string of national and international productions to his credit and featuring leading companies and actors, including Geoffrey Rush in The Don’s Last Innings, Cate Blanchett in Kafka Dances, and Jacki Weaver in Derrida in Love. Kafka Dances has won over a dozen national and international awards since its première and is the most internationally-performed Australian play of all time. Timothy Daly specialises in the complex and difficult art of dramatising significant cultural and political figures, including Franz Kafka, J.Edgar Hoover, conductor Eugene Goossens and most recently, Donald Friend, the subject of his 2017 National Library research.

Modern life can feel like an injury. Where do we turn for hope when all seems dark? It's times like these we need the consolation of art and ducks. Join us for an evening with Michael Leunig - cartoonist and philosopher - for a glimpse into his twentieth collection of cartoons Ducks for Dark Times. Explore the mind of one of Australia's most treasured artists and find the wisdom and resilience needed for anyone who is losing faith; who's becoming exhausted or fed up with the news, and for those of us who feel we could do well to laugh or weep a little more.

For lovers of Australian fiction, Alex Miller’s novels are essential reading, with writing that reveals his wit, wisdom and keen observations of life’s complexities. In conversation with author and poet Adrian Caesar, Alex Miller will reflect on how love, and the struggle to live a creative life, inspired his exquisitely personal new novel, The Passage of Love. Alex has won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize and is a two-time winner of the Miles Franklin Literary Award.

In association with Allen and Unwin