THE NATION REVIEWED

“Dick Smith depicts a nation already bursting at the seams – a place where ‘battery kids’ are raised in high-rises while we spend good money on free-range eggs: ‘We value the chickens more than our children.’ Comparing population growth to a ‘plague of locusts’, Smith forecasts ‘sheer misery and starvation’.”  

In the first Monthly Comment, Guy Pearse assesses the impending population crisis as foretold by Australia’s retail entrepreneur Dick Smith. Pearse refutes the research Smith uses as the basis of his campaign to promote a ‘small Australia’ – including encouraging two-kid families and a halving of migration. 

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In a second Comment, Sally Neighbour discusses the increasingly desperate plight of Hazara asylum seekers. An ethnic group reviled by the Pashtun Taliban in Afghanistan, the Hazara represent the majority of asylum seekers in Australia’s detention centres. Neighbour questions the recent political to-ing and fro-ing in asylum seeker policy, and outlines the dangers the Hazara face if sent back to their homeland. 

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Plus, in “Expert Appetite”, Robert Dessaix celebrates the exquisite pleasure of connoisseurship; in “Where the Heart Is”, Helen Garner shares the intimate experience of caring for her dying sister at home; and in “The Silk Road”, Adrienne Ferreira spins the little known history of silk farming in Australia.

THE MONTHLY ESSAYS

“China’s twelfth five-year plan sketches a pathway from emerging power to full superpower status. This epoch-making transition has global consequences, especially for the Asia–Pacific region. Arguably, no other document will have a more profound impact on Australia’s prosperity, security and climate.”

In “Bitter Fruits”, Andrew Charlton surveys the challenges facing China. Despite massive growth and increasing prosperity, the authoritarian government is now confronted with internal corruption, the aftershocks of the global financial crisis, and simmering social inequality and unrest. In this clear-sighted article, Charlton outlines China’s plans for the future and what these mean for Australia.

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“In the winter of 2001, Shi, his wife and their seven-year-old son boarded a one-way flight from Kingsford Smith Airport to the city of Wuxi in Jiangsu. Within five years Shi had become one of the richest men in China.”

In “The Sun King”, Eric Knight charts the many career successes of Shi Zhengrong, the Chinese–Australian solar power tycoon. From a rural childhood on an island in the Yangtze, Shi went on to found the world’s second-largest solar-cell manufacturer. Knight argues that Shi’s success comes not only from his own talents but also from the network of innovators he met while studying at UNSW.

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“Early last year, bands of plumbers, carpenters and trades assistants arrived to upgrade nearly every house in Santa Teresa – around 65 – at a total cost of $5.2 million. … By Christmas, the work was finished but houses had already begun to fail.”

In “Home Improvement”, Victoria Laurie investigates the dismal state of Indigenous housing. Architect Paul Pholeros and his non-profit organisation Healthabitat have some good solutions, but will governments listen?

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“What, then, is special about SBS, now its audience is predominantly white middle-class Australia? As one Channel Ten executive charmingly put it to me: ‘All the ethnics are watching Masterchef.’”

In “Sex Before Soccer”, Margaret Simons examines the changing role of the Special Broadcasting Service in light of the appointment of Michael Ebeid, a former ABC marketing boss, as managing director.

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“After Domingues Zaupa lost consciousness, Nair moved his Dionysian party of cocaine and prostitutes to a penthouse suite in a city hotel. Another woman, Victoria McIntyre, had been found dead in his apartment nine months earlier. Neither the Medical Board nor Nair’s employers had been informed about it.”

In “Through the Cracks”, Tanveer Ahmed peers into the murky world of Suresh Nair, the Sydney neurosurgeon in prison over the drug-related deaths of two women. As Ahmed charts the unravelling of Nair's career and personal life, he questions the role of the Medical Board in managing impaired doctors.

ARTS & LETTERS

“John Gaden, who performed in The War of the Roses, told me of a moment not long before opening when Andrews threw out a set the actors had been rehearsing with for weeks … Andrews describes the change as ‘a crucial decision … an act of destruction … a big risk’ that disconcerted the actors into new life and strengthened the epic flow of the action.”

In “Under Surveillance”, Peter Robb has an audience with theatre director Benedict Andrews, and watches the final-stage rehearsals of the Belvoir Street Theatre production of The Seagull. Andrews brings a powerful visual imagination to his direction, always approaching classic works with an experimental edge; what may confound the purists also delights new audiences.

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“It’s an affecting essay, driven by held-in emotion, and at its heart is the notion of forgiveness. ‘To be unforgiven is no great shame,’ it begins. ‘A cramp of nausea your bowels can’t clear. Sweat itches your hairline, stains your pillow.’ No great shame? The essay is taut with shame.”

 In “Ever Unforgiven”, Drusilla Modjeska reflects upon Craig Sherborne’s new novel, The Amateur Science of Love, in light of his 2008 autobiographical essay on the death of his first wife from breast cancer. Modjeska assesses the risks Sherborne faces in dealing artistically with a subject so charged.

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Plus, in “Art of Dissent”, Terry Smith discusses the art and controversy of contemporary Chinese artist Ai Weiwei; in “After They Are Gone”, Robert Forster reviews Mick Harvey’s debut solo album, Sketches from the Book of the Dead; and in “Shipped Down Under”, MJ Hyland comments on Jim Loach’s Oranges and Sunshine and Mark Lewis’ Cane Toads: The Conquest.