Big Ideas

Trailblazing feminist, political activist, journalist, and founder of Ms Magazine Gloria Steinem died this week at age 92 after a big life changing lives. In her memoir My Life on the Road she recounted how taking to the road fundamentally changed her understanding of the world and who she could be. Médecins Sans Frontières co-founder, French diplomat and novelist Jean-Christophe Rufin worked in war zones as a doctor and walked the Camino de Santiago as a pilgrim. Acclaimed poet and Yankunytjatjara woman Ali Cobby Eckermann found family, connection, and Country on a different kind of pilgrimage. This well-travelled trio joined Big Ideas host Natasha Mitchell at the Sydney Writers Festival in 2016 to explore their love of life on the road, and the bigger consequences of their transformative encounters along the way. Speakers Gloria Steinem American feminist and political activist, journalist, and founder of Ms Magazine Ali Cobby EckermannProud Yankunytjatjara womanMulti-award-winning poet and author Jean-Christophe RufinAuthor, former diplomat, doctor, co-founder of Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors without Borders This event was held in 2016 (not 2015 as mentioned) and first broadcast in 2017 on ABC Radio National.

Blockbuster Australian children's authors Andy Griffiths (The Treehouse series), Hilary Rogers aka Maddy Mara (Dragon Girls) and bookseller Tamuz Ellazam join Natasha Mitchell to share the iconic kid's books they'll be voting for in ABC Radio National's Top 100 Books (vote now!) — and weigh in on current controversies in kid's literature. Have children's books become too moralistic, too obsessed with teaching kids how to behave, or with imparting Very Important Messages? Is there a tension between education and entertainment in kid's literature? And why does all this matter? How to vote in ABC Radio National's Top 100 Books . Don't forget you can also nominate books you love that aren't on the list of suggestions. Speakers Andy Griffiths Australian Children's Laureate Popular children's author (The Treehouse series, The Bum Trilogy, the JUST! books, You & Me and The Giant Knucklehead, and more) Hilary RogersAuthor, the Girltopia trilogyCo-author (with Meredith Badger as Maddy Mara ) of the Dragon Girls, Max Beast, Itty Bitty Kitty series.Former children's publisher of Go Girl, Zac Power, Billie B Brown series Tamuz Ellazam Manager, Readings Kids bookshop in Carlton, MelbourneResearcher into children's literature Thanks to Chris Gordon and the Readings events team, and the Church of All Nations community venue. Further reading Make Believe: On Telling Stories to Children (2026), by Mac Barnett A Beloved Children's Book Author Said Most Children's Literature Is "Crud." It Has Not Gone Well. Children's Book Community Responds in Outrage to Mac Barnett Comments Mac Barnett on Make Believe (video) Mac Barnett Responds Amid Continued Backlash SOME FAVOURITE AUSTRALIAN CHILDREN'S BOOK NOMINATIONS Andy Griffiths The Magic Pudding by Norman Lindsay the pudding Coles Funny Picture Book by E.W. Cole Seven Little Australians by Ethel Turner My Place by Nadia Wheatley & Donna Rawlins My Place in Space by Robin and Sally Hirst, illustrated by Roland Harvey Bamboozled by David Legge Unreal by Paul Jennings Magic Beach by Alison Lester Sunshine (and Moonlight) by Jan OrmerodAll Right, Vegemite! and Far Out, Brussel Sprout! by June Factor And more! Hilary Rogers The Terrible Plop by Ursula Dubosarsky and Andy Joyner My Shadow is Pink by Scott Stuart Hating Alison Ashley by Robin KleinPlaying Beatie Bow by Ruth Park And more! Tamuz EllazamThe Bunyip of Berkeley's Creek by Jenny Wagner Possum Magic by Mem Fox and Jenny Vivas Stay For Dinner by Sandhya Parappukkaran and Michelle PereiraOnce I was a Giant by Zeno Sworder Derek the Dinosaur by Mary Blackwood and Kerry Argent And more!

From the drama of her private world to the diplomacy of her position as queen. From the woman her family knew to the public figure the world saw. With unique access to royal family members, senior staff, and advisers Robert Hardman explores the parallel lives of Elizabeth as daughter, wife, mother and sovereign. Inside the Life of Elizabeth II was presented by the Royal Society of Arts , UK Speakers Robert Hardman British author, journalist and documentary filmmakerAuthor of Elizabeth II: In Private. In Public. The Inside Story. Emily AndrewsJournalist and royal commentator

Leading tech critic Cory Doctorow coined the term "enshittification" to describe the slow decay of the digital platforms most of us are now forced to rely upon to operate in the modern world. So why and how did the internet get bad, and is it too late for people, countries and governments to reclaim technology as a force for humanity and the common good? This episode was recorded on 25 August 2026 at The Wheeler Centre , Australia's first dedicated centre for Books, Writing and Ideas, in partnership with RMIT University for Now or Never festival. Explore more discussions like this one on The Wheeler Centre podcast — available wherever you listen to podcasts. Follow @wheelercentre for updates. Speakers: Cory Doctorow Journalist, technology activist and author, Enshittifcation: Why everything suddenly got worse and what to do about it, The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI and more, podcaster, Who broke the internet? (CBC), and blogger craphound.com Lisa Given Distinguished Professor of Information Sciences, RMIT UniversityDirector of the Centre for Human AI Information Environments

She's the little girl in some of her father's most famous paintings, but life as the eldest child of artists John Brack and Helen Maudsley wasn't always easy. Clara Brack explores her childhood — and her parents' complex lives and relationship — in her new book The Secret Landscapes on not [pleasing your mother, which took her 20 years to write. This event was recorded at the Willy Lit Fest on 13 June 2026. Speakers: Clara Brack Author, The Secret Landscapes — on not pleasing your mother Gabriella Coslovich Award-winning freelance arts journalist (formerly of The Age), author, Whiteley on Trial

Philosopher Roman Krznaric, author of History for Tomorrow: Inspiration from the Past for the Future of Humanity, The Good Ancestor, and founder of the Empathy Museum has been looking backwards to help us all find a way forward. What he discovered in the global history of human solidarity and social movements was a wellspring of brilliant solutions to current challenges — democracy, fossil fuels, hyper-consumerism, water, AI, racism, even rage bait on social media, and more. Join Roman with Big Ideas host Natasha Mitchell at the 2026 Byron Writers Festival to challenge the 'tyranny of the now' with an exciting view of history as a source of radical hope. Speaker Dr Roman Krznaric Author, History for Tomorrow (2024), The Good Ancestor (2020), What the Rich Don't Tell The Poor (2022), The Wonder Box (2011), Empathy (2014), How to Find Fulfilling Work (2012)Senior Research Fellow, Oxford University’s Centre for Eudaimonia and Human Flourishing Research Fellow, Long Now Foundation Member, Club of RomeFounder, world’s first Empathy Museum . Thanks to Jessica Alice, artistic director and CEO of the Byron Writers Festival, and the festival team.

From their earliest days as blues-obsessed kids living in freezing squalor, to the first taste of fame and the day they landed in the US and went stratospheric — and all the grit, glamour and gore in between. There are myriad revisions to the conventional narrative which underscore just how in control of their narrative the band has been up to now. But Bob Spitz got unique access to the group's friends and family. And he's sharing the details and examines a creative force whose power shows no signs of fading, over sixty years on. Presented at the Free Library of Philadelphia Speakers Bob Spitz American journalist and author of Rolling Stones, The Biography Dan DeLuca Pop music critic for the Philadelphia Inquirer

Since 1996, The Cooks Companion has been a bible for Australian kitchens, a reliable friend who can tell you how to boil an egg, bake some bread, roast a chook, whip up a lemon delicious pudding — and much, much more. What is it about this book that's made it such an enduring go-to for household cooks for generations? This event was recorded live at the Sydney Writers' Festival at Carriageworks on 21 May 2026. Vote now in ABC Radio National's Top 100 Australian Books. Speakers: Stephanie Alexander Author of 18 books including The Cooks Companion Founder of the Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation Chef Adam Liaw (host)Author of Two Asian Kitchens , Asian After Work: Simple Food for Every Day , Adam's Big Pot series, and moreHost, The Cook Up with Adam Liaw (SBS)Recipe writer — The Good Weekend Winner, Masterchef (2010)

When a book becomes a hit TV series, or a play becomes a Hollywood film, what makes it a great adaptation? Meet the creators of these international smash hits as they take you behind the scenes, into the writers' rooms, and inside their creative minds. Suzie Miller's award-winning play Prima Facie has just become a Hollywood film starring Cynthia Erivo, while the sixth season of television's Slow Horses, based on Mick Herron's bestselling spy novels, starts next month. This event was recorded live at the 2026 Sydney Writers' Festival at Carriageworks . Speakers: Mick Herron Author, Slough House series, Down Cemetary Road series and more Suzie Miller Playwright, novelist and screen writer, Prima Facie, Interalia, Strong is the New Pretty and more Benjamin Law (host)Journalist, columnist, TV screenwriter and author of The Family Law, Gaysia: Adventures in the Queer East and Quarterly Essay 67: Moral Panic 101Creator and co-writer of award-winning SBS TV series The Family Law

Interesting idea or nanny-state gone way too far? If babies weren't born to doom scroll, why do we think grown-ups are? Don't miss our hilarious annual battle of brains and bravado with two teams and Big Ideas' host Natasha Mitchell at the Beaker Street Festival: where science meets art. Australia was the first country in the world to ban under-16s from social media. France just struck down a push for the same. Are adults immune to all the harms of these platforms? Should OVER-16s be banned too!? TEAM AFFIRMATIVE: "THE VIRAL INFLUENZAS" Dr Esmé Louise James, sex historian Returning debate champion and sex historian, creator of the book and viral TikTok phenomenon Kinky History, co-host with her mathematician mother of two seasons of the Sextistics series on Youtube, and her first novel Becoming Venus is out on September 1, 2026. Saul Eslake, economist Saul has been chief economist at the big end of town with big banks, he now runs his own consultancy, is a Vice-Chancellor's Fellow at the University of Tasmania, advises Australia's Parliamentary Budget Office, serves on the Council on the Ageing, and is a regular expert chatterbox in the media. Dr Meredith Castles, human-computer interaction researcher and lecturer Meredith is a science communicator and a lecturer in human-computer interaction at the University of Tasmania's School of Information and Communication Technology. She's interested in ethical, accessible, inclusive, and human-centred technology — and how to design it so it's nice, not nasty. TEAM NEGATIVE: "THE YAPPERS" Professor Barbara Holland, statistician Former reigning Beaker Street debate champion, Barbara is a mathematician in the School of Natural Sciences at the University of Tasmania. She fell in love with the power of statistics, made it her life's work, and works with biologists and uses stats to unravel the big biological puzzle that is the evolution of life on Earth. Dr Kirsten Banks You know her as AstroKirsten on the socials, youtube, on screens and stages everywhere. Kirsten is an astrophysicist, science communicator, and proud Wiradjuri woman who mixes science with humour — and her passion for the cosmos — to help us all reach the stars. Dr Tim Nugent Tim is a co-founder of Yarn Spinner, a spin-off of the award-winning Tasmanian grown gaming studio Secret Lab. He and his team build games and narrative tools for games for both indie and major studio releases. He is the co-author of a stack of computery, programmy books, and he did a PhD on mobile human computer interaction and information flow in public spaces. Thanks to Dr Margo Adler, Rosie Pidd, Stevie and the Bunsen Burners, and the whole festival team.

Acclaimed journalist Kerry O'Brien has seen it all, but nothing like right now. And he's not mincing his words. On AI, neoliberalism, education, equality, gutless governments, and more. For over 50 years, he covered the world's biggest stories and changemakers, and asked tough questions of power. Hear why he thinks a perfect storm threatens our society and our politics, and what he thinks can be done about it. The 2026 Thea Astley Address was recorded at the Byron Writers Festival on Saturday 15 August 2026. Speakers: Kerry O'Brien Former ABC journalist, host, 7.30 Report, Four Corners, Lateline and more, six-time Walkley award winner Richard Flanagan Man Booker Prize and Baille Gifford award winning author of The Narrow Road to the Deep North, Heresies, and more

It's estimated that one in three Australian households have experienced food insecurity. At the same time, one third of all food produced in Australia gets thrown out. For more than two decades, Ronni Kahn has been fighting these dual challenges as head of food rescue charity OzHarvest. She argues these ongoing dual challenges show a failure of imagination and of will. The 2026 Kenneth Myer Lecture was recorded at the National Library of Australia in Canberra on 4 August and in Melbourne on 6 August . Speakers: Ronni KahnFounder, OzHarvest

Australia is home to some 25,000 plant species. And nine out of 10 Australian plants occur nowhere else on Earth. But many are under threat. So why does that matter? This National Science Week, we meet a plant ecologist with a message. This conversation was recorded at the Lyrebird Festival in the Blue Mountains of NSW. Speakers: Rachael Gallagher Professor in Plant Ecology and Conservation, Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment, Western Sydney University Gregg Borschmann (host)Oral historian, journalist and writer Further information: What is Australia's most amazing wildflower? Vote now - ABC Science Week The Australasian Virtual Herbarium

Dystopia or utopia? How do you imagine the future? In films and books, the future is often filled with alien invasions, nuclear war or the zombie apocalypse. But a movement of Indigenous storytellers is reshaping traditional science fiction tropes based on their own storytelling cultures and experiences. This event was recorded at the Melbourne Writers Festival on 10 May 2026. Speakers: Chelsea Vowel Candian Metis language instructor, public intellectual, writer, and activist educatorAuthor, Indigenous Writes: A Guide to First Nations, Métis & Inuit in Canada and the short-story collection Buffalo is the New BuffaloCo-host, Métis in Space podcast Mykaela Saunders Koori and Lebanese award-winning writerAuthor of Always Will BePost-doctoral research fellow on First Nations speculative fiction at Macquarie University

We're going extraterrestrial with a panel of super star space scientists who are exploring the solar system and beyond. Will they find life out there? Which is the universe's best planet? And what's Matt Damon got to do with it? Incredible tales from Mars, Jupiter, and more. This event was recorded at the World Science Festival Brisbane on 29 March 2026. Speakers: Tracy Drain Chief Engineer with NASA's Europa Clipper Mission to Jupiter David Flannery Associate Professor of astrobiology, Queensland University of Technology Sara Webb Author, science communicator and astrophysicist, Swinburne University Brian Schmidt Distinguished Professor of astrophysics, Australian National University, 2011 Nobel Prize for Physics Tamara Davis (host) Professor of Astrophysics, University of Queensland

Think about the person whose politics you find most baffling, or most infuriating. Now imagine you must make a decision together. Actually negotiate, project forward, find common ground. That's democracy. And it turns out our brains aren't especially well-built for it. In an era shaped by inequality, environmental crisis and the decline of democratic institutions understanding how we make political decisions might be one of the most urgent questions we face. Recorded live at the Melbourne Writers Festival as part of the Wheeler Centre's The Fifth Estate series. Speakers Dr David Moscrop Politics columnist for The Washington Post, The Walrus, Time Magazine, The Globe, The Guardian and othersAuthor of Too Dumb For Democracy: Why We Make Bad Political Decisions And How We Can Make Better Ones Dr Sally Warhaft Melbourne based freelance broadcaster, anthropologist and writer. Host of The Wheeler Centre's series The Fifth Estate

It's been called the idiot box, the drug of the nation, the tube. This year marks 100 years of broadcast television. Over its lifetime, TV has adapted to big changes in technology, government policy, culture and media consumption habits. And yet, while its future remains uncertain, for now, it endures. This is the incredible true story of television. This keynote address was recorded at RMIT University's 100 Years of Broadcast TV Symposium: The impact and future of broadcast TV in Australia . Speakers: Professor Jock Given Adjunct Professor of Media and Communications, Swinburne UniversityAuthor, The Death of Broadcasting: Media's digital future and Turning off the television: broadcasting's uncertain future Dr Damien O'Meara RMIT Lecturer in Public Relations, RMIT University Dr Alexa Scarlata Lecturer in Digital Communication, RMIT University

How free should artists be to make risky work, to provoke, to get political? Who gets to decide if a work of art is deemed too risky, too dangerous, too difficult? Cancellations. Censorship. Controversy. Political pressure. Mass boycotts. The collapse of festivals. The Australian arts community has seen it all recently, in part triggered by the devastation in the Middle East. But is there more going on too? Join Big Ideas host Natasha Mitchell with a panel of arts and culture heavyweights to consider the future of artistic freedom and democracy in this country — and why both matter in these fractious times. This event was organised by Griffith University and Griffith Law School. Speakers Professor Julianne Schultz Professor Emerita of Media and Culture at the Centre for Social and Cultural Research at Griffith University. Columnist, Guardian Australia Board member, Sydney Writers FestivalAuthor, The Idea of Australia: A Search for the Soul of the Nation.Founding editor, Griffith Review. Dr André Dao Winner of the Prime Minister's Literary Award for Fiction for his debut novel AnamWinner of the Pascal Prize for Cultural Criticism for his pubished essays.Postdoctoral fellow in international law at Melbourne Law SchoolCo-creator of the asylum seeker oral history project Behind the Wire. Author, The role of the committed writer in an unfree world (Overland Magazine, 2026)Presenter, The State of the (Writing) Nation (2023) Dr Ben Eltham Cultural policy researcher and consultant, freelance arts journalist and critic.Lecturer in the School of Media, Film and Journalism at Monash University. Fellow, Centre for Policy Development Thanks also to Professor Sarah Joseph, Dr Karen Crawley, Dr Samid Suliman at Griffith University.

Gods and goddesses, heroes and monsters, quests and odysseys, sex and violence. Greek mythology seemingly has it all. And as Christopher Nolan's box office smash retelling of the Greek epic The Odyssey suggests, these stories will never die. Join three superstar writers with their own mythical retellings to explore why these stories endure and how they have been re-imagined over time. The event Mythical Retellings was recorded at the Melbourne Writers Festival on 10 May 2026. Speakers: Yann Martel Author, Son of Nobody , The Life of Pi (Winner of the 2002 Man Booker Prize) and more Nikita Gill International best-selling poet, playwright, illustrator, actor and author, Hekate: The Witch and more Zoe Terakes Actor, playwright and author, Eros: Queer Myths for Lovers Carody Culver (host)Editor, Griffith Review

As the great powers renegotiate their alliances and priorities, Africa is reshaping its future. From the promise of digital economies and homegrown innovation to the complex legacies of foreign aid, debt and dependency — this is a conversation about power, possibility, and the remaking of a continent on its own terms. What needs to change in policy, in investment, in the stories we tell for Africa's ambitions to be fully realised? Africa and the World: Reclaiming Agency in a Shifting Geopolitical Landscape was presented at Havard Kennedy School ’s Institute of Politics (IOP) and their Africa Development Conference Speakers Dr Jendayi Frazer Former US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs H.E Ameenah Gurib Fakeem Former President of Mauritius H.E. Mark-Alexandre Doumba Minister of Digital Economy & Innovation of Gabon Mayowa Kuyoro (host)Partner at McKinsey & Co