Big Ideas

• Alison Lester and Jane Godwin on how children’s books change lives

  Even years later, children's books can hold a special place in our hearts, and they also teach, comfort, inspire, and grow young minds, and set kids up for life. Two of Australia's best loved children's authors explore the importance of storytelling for children, and reflect on the books that have changed their lives.This talk was recorded at the Sorrento Writers Festival on 24 April 2025.SpeakersAlison Lester - Author, Magic Beach, Imagine, Noni the Pony, Kissed by the Moon and many more, Inaugural Children's Laureate 2012-13, Ambassador, Indigenous Literacy FoundationJane Godwin - Gogo and the Silver Shoes, Today we have no plans, Red House, Blue House, Green House, Treehouse, Say Hello and many moreFrancesca Carter (host) Sorrento Writers FestivalFrom the archives:Which subjects are taboo in children's books?Big Ideas, ABC Radio National, 11 September 2019

  --------  

  53:54

  --------

  53:54
• From devil horns to deep listening — Maxine Beneba Clark, Debra Dank, Damon Young on the power of communication

  From  finding the right language to connect to Country, making the world a more poetic place for kids, to a Vulcan salute between two lovers — communication makes the world go round. Three brilliantly creative communicators join Big Ideas host Natasha Mitchell at the 2025 Byron Writers Festival to consider ways we communicate and how we can do it better. With great communication comes deep connection, understanding, meaning and that wonderful feeling of being understood and understanding another. With bad communication comes deep misunderstanding, disconnection, confusion, and conflict.SpeakersDr Debra DankGudanji, Wakaja, Kalkadoon womanEnterprise Fellow, University of South AustraliaAuthor of Terraglossia (2025) and We Come With This Place (2022)Winner of four New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards in 2023, including Book of the Year.Maxine Beneba ClarkWriter, poet, author and children's author of Afro-Caribbean descentMulti-award winning author of more than fifteen books including The Hate Race (2018), Foreign Soil (2017), Carrying the World, Stuff I'm Not Sorry For: 99 poems for young people (2025) and forthcoming in 2025 is Beautiful Changelings.Inaugural Poet in Residence at the University of MelbourneWinner of the Victorian Premier's Literary Award for PoetryDr Damon YoungAward-winning philosopher, author and children's authorAuthor of thirteen books including On Getting Off: Sex and Philosophy (2020), The Art of Reading (2016), Philosophy in the Garden (2012), and Immortal Gestures: Journeys Into the Unspoken (2025)Our thanks to the 2025 Byron Writers Festival director Jessica Alice and team.

  --------  

  53:54

  --------

  53:54
• How a picnic started the fall of the Iron Curtain

  A brass band, goulash cooking in giant pots over open flames, people dancing around a bonfire — a pan-European picnic at the border between Hungary and Austria in 1989 was the beginning of the end of the Cold War. Suddenly hundreds of East Germans stormed the border into the West and freedom. It's a moment in history where the power of ordinary people changed the world.An Escape to Freedom and the Collapse of the Iron Curtain was presented at the Adelaide Writers' WeekSpeakersMatthew LongoAuthor of The Picnic: A Dream of Freedom and the Collapse of the Iron CurtainAssistant Professor of Political Science at Leiden UniversityAnnabelle Quince (host)ABC broadcaster and presenter of ABC Radio National's Rear Vision

  --------  

  54:36

  --------

  54:36
• Anna Funder — Bears out there, writing in the age of bots and broligarchs

  Without permission, or payment, artificial intelligence has stolen the published words of thousands of Australian writers, and it seems that they have little power to stop it.  What does this mean for the future of human creativity?Anna Funder's speech was recorded live at the 2025 Sydney Writers Festival.The panel discussion, Can Australian literature survive in the age of streamers & AI? was recorded at Readings bookshop in Hawthorn.SpeakersAnna Funder - Author, Wifedom, Stasiland, All that I AmSophie Cunningham - Writer, artist, teacher, speaker and advocate, Chair of the Board of the Australian Society of Authors, non- executive director of the Copyright AgencyEmily Bitto - Author, The Strays (2015 Stella Prize winner), Wild AbandonJenny Darling - Literary agent, Jenny Darling & AssociatesBen Eltham (host) - Arts, media and cultural critic, commentator and journalist

  --------  

  1:00:46

  --------

  1:00:46
• The remarkable life of Marie Curie and the women scientists she inspired — with Dava Sobel

  Marie Curie is arguably the most famous scientist in history, for her breakthroughs in the field of radioactivity. But Curie also redefined what was possible for women in science, inspiring generations to follow her.Dava Sobel's 2025 For Future Reference Lecture A woman's word (about science) was recorded at the State Library of Victoria.SpeakersDava SobelAuthor, The Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science and many moreBelinda Smith (host)Award-winning science journalist, Host, Labnotes, ABC Radio National

  --------  

  52:55

  --------

  52:55

More News podcasts

Trending News podcasts

About Big Ideas

Big Ideas: Podcasts in Family