The Wheeler Centre

She’s changed the face of American rock music in Sonic Youth, crashed at Cindy Sherman’s place, she’s produced a Hole record, she’s collaborated with Yoko Ono and she’s an idol to the likes of Carrie Brownstein and Michael Stipe. There’s only one Kim Gordon, and in this episode of the Wheeler Centre podcast, she joins Fee B-Squared for a conversation recorded live at the Astor Theatre.

In this discussion, we’ll examine the relationships between viewers, writers and networks. How do screenwriters deal with the heightened attention of on-demand viewing? How do networks and platforms test new shows and talent? What’s the difference between a network and a platform … and will appointment TV endure in any form?

If anyone can shed light on the fascinating and powerful political figures of Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull and Opposition Leader Bill Shorten, and their recent political manoeuvres, it’s David Marr and Annabel Crabb. What do these two writers see as the most pressing complications for both Turnbull and Shorten, and for Australia's voting public? Who and what influences these politicians … and what's love got to do with it? Listen as they share a lively, illuminating conversation about political personalities and the will to power.

What’s the state of literary criticism for children’s books? How is the business of children’s book publishing changing, at home and abroad? How do we keep feeding insatiable young bookworms and how do we create new reading converts? Tune in for some answers to these and other questions, in a lively conversation about kids, creativity and the business of books.

All sorts of lofty ideals are projected onto the world of competitive sport. Sport is supposed to unite people across races and cultures. It’s supposed to deliver us role models. It’s supposed to provide a common talking point across social divides. Our expectations of sporting figures and sporting events sometimes seem unreasonably high and, at other times, contemptibly low. What happens when we examine these expectations through the lens of human rights? Can sporting boycotts embarrass governments into addressing human rights abuses? What are the costs of major sporting events like the Olympic Games and the World Cup in terms of human displacement? How well do events such as the Paralympics enhance the human rights of people with disabilities? And, what toll does public scrutiny play on the personal lives of athletes? Does the demand that athletes act as model citizens – or model representatives for racial or cultural minorities – infringe on their personal freedom and privacy?

What purpose does punishment play in society? Is punishment good for you? And what is the connection between punishment, justice, catharsis and redemption?

Recorded live at The Toff in Town, Maxine Beneba Clarke reads Howl to modern music by jazz composer Darrin Archer. Archer’s composition, called 'Drunken Taxicabs of Absolute Reality: Howl to Music', features a seven-piece jazz band and aims to create a sonic landscape that accompanies and interacts with Allen Ginsberg’s seminal poem. Ginsberg himself described Howl as a ‘tragic custard-pie of wild phrasing’. Tune in to Archer and Beneba Clarke as they bring that wild phrasing to life, more than 60 years after Ginsberg’s first reading.

Join novelist, memoirist, screenwriter, trickster William Boyd as he talks fiction, photography and the art of the hoax with Toni Jordan.

Joined by host Kaz Cooke, feminist writer Susie Orbach talks about psychotherapy, feminism and our love/hate relationship with food.

Do you feel anxiety and dread when you think of the looming election? Do you feel sick at the thought of the beckoning ballot box? Then join us for a bout of comedy designed to cure even the worst cases of electoral dysfunction. Comedian and writer Toby Halligan hosts a bunch of Australia’s sharpest political comics as they pull apart the bizarre, the absurd, the dismaying and the disastrous antics of Canberra’s finest. They talk policy, strategy, oratory, zingers, stunts and blunders from the campaign trail; no party or politician is safe.