Late Night Live — Full program podcast

After President Lula de Silva's comeback election victory in Brazil, his defeated opponent Flavio Bolsonaro vanished from the country. What now lies ahead for the giant South American nation, under the 81 year-old Lula? Plus, a new biography explores the complexities of Geoffrey Bardon, the white Australian school teacher who became a key figure in the contemporary Indigenous art movement of the 1970s, while battling his own demons. Guests: Deborah Barros Leal Farias, Associate Professor at the University of New South Wales Kitty Hauser, author of 'Art Mania: Geoffrey Bardon and the Painting Men of Papunya', Giromondo Press Get in touch: We'd love to hear from you. Email us at latenightlive_rn@abc.net.au

Correspondent Irris Makler joins Late Night Live as the votes are tallied after Israel's election - with a deadlock looking increasingly likely. Plus the story behind the European lawyers, who fled to Australia after World War Two. Guests: Irris Makler, veteran Middle East Correspondent Katherine Biber, historian and Professor of Law, University of Technology, Sydney Get in touch: We'd love to hear from you. Email us at latenightlive_rn@abc.net.au

UK journalist Ian Dunt previews PM Andy Burnham's first budget, plus a new book analyses published and unpublished polling data to understand how and why the 2023 Voice to Parliament referendum failed to win the majority support of the Australian public. Guests: Ian Dunt, columnist for i-news, co-host of Origin Story podcast Professor Murray Goot, Macquarie University and Professor Emeritus Tim Rowse, Western Sydney University, co-authors 'The Year Our Voice Broke' (2026) Get in touch: We'd love to hear from you. Email us at latenightlive_rn@abc.net.au

Anna Henderson discusses the ongoing debate over the connection between the tone of political rhetoric and real world acts of violence, since the attack on Independent MP Helen Haines, plus whether the government's use of algorithms in aged care assessments shows it has learned the lessons of Robodebt. France’s debt is mounting, its governments are paralysed and public anger is spilling into the streets. As the political centre falters, far-right leader Marine Le Pen is waiting to capitalise. Plus, bones are an extraordinary record of human life, holding clues to our histories, our societies and the ways we die. From forensic science to Europe’s vast ossuaries, what can the dead tell us about the living? Guests: Anna Henderson, Chief Political Correspondent, SBS James Waterhouse, BBC Paris Correspondent Carla Valentine, author, The Language of Bones

Correspondent Irris Makler joins Late Night Live from Israel, days away from the country's elections. Plus, Washington journalist Susan Page details Queen Elizabeth II's relationship with 13 US presidents, from Truman to Trump. Guests: Irris Makler, journalist and former Jerusalem correspondent, France24 Susan Page, Washington, D.C. bureau chief for USA Today, author of 'The Queen and Her Presidents' Get in touch: We'd love to hear from you! Email us at latenightlive_rn@abc.net.au

Veteran Iraqi journalist Ghaith Abdul-Ahad contemplates Iraq's 'impossible predicament' in the wake of the final withdrawal of remaining US personnel and amid ongoing corruption battles. Plus Indonesian writer Tari Lang recalls Indonesia's bloody 1965 coup, and growing up in the same neighbourhood as dictator Suharto. Guests: Ghaith Abdul-Ahad, journalist for The Guardian Tari Lang, author 'My neighbour, the dictator: Coming of age in the shadow of Indonesia's 1965 coup'

Bruce Shapiro counts down to the US midterm elections. Dr Rupa Nara of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) returns from a recent mission to the epicentre of the Ebola crisis. Plus, are researchers finally decoding the mysterious Inca 'language' of knotted strings? Guests: Bruce Shapiro, contributing editor for The Nation, Executive Director for the Global Centre of Journalism and Trauma Dr Rupa Nara, paediatrician, Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) Professor Sabine Hyland, anthropologist from the University of St Andrews Get in touch: We'd love to hear from you! Email us at latenightlive_rn@abc.net.au

Anna Henderson on the attack on Independent MP for Indi, Helen Haines. Plus tensions between the PM and Treasurer Jim Chalmers over credit card payments, and why the Nationals won't support the EU trade agreement. Also on the show, India's youth movement, the Cockroach Janta Party, is testing Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's grip on power. Plus hordes of yabbies are trashing rivers in southern Africa. Guests: Anna Henderson, chief political correspondent, SBS Maya Tudor, Professor of Politics and Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford Dr Rachael King, specialist in freshwater and marine invertebrates, Head of Research, SA Museum

A new documentary looks back at the career of fiercely independent journalist and host of Democracy Now ! Amy Goodman and why she thinks independent media and dissent are what will save us from despots. Plus another documentary looks back at the fight against the Hindmarsh Island bridge in South Australia, the place where Ngarrindjeri women conducted sacred women's business and refused to back down on their right to keep it secret. Guests: Tracey Rigney, writer/director KUMARANGK: Sacred Women’s Business and Steve Kenny, one the lawyers who represented the Ngarrindjeri people Amy Goodman, journalist, co-host of Democracy Now! Star of the new documentary film Steal this story, Please! Get in touch: We'd love to hear from you! Email us at latenightlive_rn@abc.net.au

Australia's unique alpine eucalypt is starting to die out. The High Country may never be the same again, a new book argues. And longstanding New Yorker magazine writer Susan Orlean, author of 'The Orchid Thief' and 'The Library Book', on her fascination with the stories of people who are not famous or powerful. Guests: Ant Sharwood and Anna Langford, co-authors of 'The last snow gum' (Hachette) Susan Orlean, on a speaking tour of Australia. Her latest book is 'Joyride: a memoir'

Ian Dunt on UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham's push for a reset in Britain’s relationship with the EU. Could this be the beginning of the end for Brexit? Yanis Varoufakis' take on Greece's recent multi-billion dollar defence deals with the US and Israel. Plus mathematics professor Clemency Montelle takes us through the history and the importance of zero. Guests: Ian Dunt, iNews columnist and regular LNL commentator Yanis Varoufakis - leader of the Democracy in Europe Movement and co-host The Econoclasts podcast Clemency Montelle - professor in the School of Mathematics and Statistics at the University of Canterbury, New Zealand Get in touch: We'd love to hear from you! Email us at latenightlive_rn@abc.net.au

When Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was elected he promised to address a gap in federal anti-discrimination law which allowed faith-based schools to sack gay kids and teachers, but he has thus far failed to do so. Now Independent MP for Wentworth, Allegra Spender, has introduced a bill to end the right of religious schools and universities to punish gay and trans pupils and staff. Plus, as AI reshapes society, what does it mean to be human? Father Paolo Benanti, advisor to the Holy Sea on AI Ethics is in Australia to examine the moral questions posed by artificial intelligence. Guests: Allegra Spencer, Member for Wentworth Father Paolo Benanti, Professor at the Pontifical Gregorian University, in Rome, and advisor to the Holy Sea on AI Ethics

Two writers investigate two mysteries from 19th Century Australia. Kate Grenville uncovers a bundle of letters in the archives about the NSW country school teacher Joseph Connor, accused of beating his students. Was he a monster or the victim of a small-town vendetta? And Sally Young solves Australia's strangest political crime: the theft of the ceremonial mace from Victoria's state parliament in 1891. Guests: Kate Grenville, author, 'The Country Schoolmaster: A Mystery in 88 Letters' Sally Young, author, 'The Curious Case of the Stolen Mace: Solving Australia's Strangest Political Crime'

The Lord of the Rings made J.R.R. Tolkien one of the most influential writers of the 20th century. But who was the obsessive, conservative and often difficult man behind Middle-earth? And Heather Morris, author of The Tattooist of Auschwitz, has a new and equally remarkable true story to tell. In 1942 in Nazi-occupied Paris, the Nazis arrest a Jewish family, but their 11-year-old daughter escapes to her piano teacher, Andrée Levallois. Andrée is secretly a French Resistance operative who risks everything, including her own family, to hide the child. Guests: DJ Taylor, author of The King under the Mountain Heather Morris, author of The Piano teacher of Montparnasse Get in touch: We'd love to hear from you! Email us at latenightlive_rn@abc.net.au

Our regular US political commentator on the Cornell University sexual assault case, the failed execution of Christa Pike, and the dire outlook for the Republicans, four weeks before the midterms. Valerie Trouet, a paleo-climate scientist, compares tree rings from living trees with historical and archaeological wood to reconstruct climate patterns going back thousands of years. It enables her to look at how climate has influenced wars, empires and natural disasters. Guests: Bruce Shapiro, contributing editor with The Nation magazine and Director of the Global Center for Journalism and Trauma Valerie Trouet, professor in the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research at the University of Arizona. Book 'Tree Story: The History of the World Written in Rings'

We revisit two memorable LNL conversations from recent times: Simon Winchester's cultural history of the wind, and Australian writer Lech Blaine's astonishing account of his beautiful, terrifying childhood - growing up in Queensland pubs stalked by Christian fanatics. Guests: Simon Winchester, journalist and author of The Breath of the Gods: The History and Future of the Wind Lech Blaine, author of Australian Gospel

Confronted with a series of existential threats, Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor argue in their new book that wealthy billionaires, including the so-called "tech bros", have become focused not on how we can deal with those threats, but who will best survive them. They warn there is an urgent need for far more limits on dangerous technologies than US President Donald Trump's Whitehouse accord. Plus meet the author who breakfasted in ten Indian cities, to discover how Indian culture is reflected through its breakfast foods, makers and consumers. Guests: Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor, co-authors, End times fascism and the fight for the living world Priyadarshini Chatterjee, Kolkata-based travel, culture and food writer Get in touch: We'd love to hear from you! Email us at latenightlive_rn@abc.net.au

The German Peasants' War was the greatest popular uprising in Western Europe before the French Revolution. In 1524 and 1525, it swept across Germany with astonishing speed as thousands of people massed in armed bands to demand a new and more egalitarian order. The response from feudal overlords was brutal, but while the rebellion was suppressed, it would continue to influence subsequent revolts, contribute to the emergence of peasant and worker movements in the following centuries and serve as a precursor to larger social and political transformations in Europe. Guest: Professor Lyndal Roper, Regius Professor of History at Oriel College, Oxford University and author of Summer of Fire and Blood: The German Peasants' War, published by Hachette Producer: Catherine Zengerer

A host of new companies are rushing to apply for seabed exploration licences promised by the Trump administration - but are they equipped for this venture? Plus, trauma has gone from the clinic to the culture wars, but is a politics built around personal suffering crowding out class, power and solidarity? Guests Todd Woody, Reporter, Bloomberg News Catherine Liu, Professor of Film & Media Studies at the University of California, Author of Traumatised: The New Politics of public suffering

Mark Kenny reviews PM Anthony Albanese's week at the United Nations in New York, and asks whether the Australian leader should be more assertive in rebuking the US President, on issues like the regulation of AI. Volkswagon is cutting jobs, considering factory closures, and even turning one car plant towards defence production. Can the company reinvent itself before its glory days become history? And David Marr takes you to the outback, to see Kati Thanda-Lake Eyre in flood. Guests Mark Kenny, Director of the Australian Studies Institute, host of Democracy Sausage podcast; Jack Ewing, Journalist, New York Times David Marr, Late Night Live presenter