The Monthly | Australian politics, society & culture

Essays  Right arrow

Science and technology

The Sun also revises

A scandal in Australia’s space science community suggests the need for increased rigour in reviewing possible research misconduct in our universities

The Sun also revises
Safe as houses?

Federal politics

Safe as houses?

With an election imminent, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese talks up his first-term achievements while acknowledging voter disgruntlement

End matter

Federal politics

End matter

The demise of the China Matters think tank raises questions about how governments deal with voices they don’t want to hear

Still throwing stones

Society

Still throwing stones

Thirty years after Helen Garner’s ‘The First Stone’, debates continue over staff-student relationships and consent on campus


The Nation Reviewed  Right arrow

Close-up of Opposition Leader Peter Dutton and Shadow Minister for Indigenous Australians Jacinta Nampijinpa Price at lectern in front of Australian flag

Indigenous rights

The annuls of history

The battlegrounds of the history wars have moved from niche media to our national politics, and truth-telling is the biggest casualty

Illustration by Jeff Fisher

Society

High flying bird

Melbourne’s on-again off-again embrace of street art is now tested by the trial of the alleged artist behind ‘Pam the Bird’

Illustration by Jeff Fisher

Society

Diplomatic insolence

Remembering lessons in the art of derailing and the power of obfuscation at a Year 10 Model United Nations day

Arts and Letters  Right arrow

Still from ‘The Brutalist’

Architecture

Brute force: ‘The Brutalist’ and architecture on film

The Oscar-nominated postwar story of an autocratic immigrant architect in the US unwittingly mirrors Donald Trump’s edict on public buildings

Detail of Julie Mehretu, ‘Haka (and Riot)’

Art

Surface tension: Julie Mehretu at MCA

An exhibition of the Ethiopian-American painter’s works built upon obscured news media suggests even abstract art must be connected to the world

‘Macbeth’ at Donmar Warehouse, London

Theatre

The song remains the thane: ‘Macbeth’

A new production of ‘Macbeth’ starring David Tennant is an opportunity to consider if it might provide the quintessential tragic role

Illustration by Jeff Fisher

Poems

Grief

Bearing heartbreaking witness to the fading memory of an elderly, lone parent

Noted  Right arrow

Cover of ‘Flesh’

Books

David Szalay’s ‘Flesh’

The Hungarian-English novelist’s latest is another tale of human failure, managing to turn his characters’ inability to feel into something affecting

Still from ‘The Last Showgirl’

Film

Gia Coppola’s ‘The Last Showgirl’

Pamela Anderson is captivating as a veteran Vegas dancer contemplating life offstage as her revue is replaced by more risqué acts

Life sentences Right arrow

Flowers being watered

‘You do what you must do, and you do it well’

A lifelong mantra first heard when the author was six, courtesy of Bob Dylan, serves to calm the pursuit of perfectionism

Online latest  Right arrow

The Duke family portrait left on the moon, April 23, 1972

Family and relationships

The ego has landed

More than half a century ago, American astronaut Charlie Duke left a photo of his family on the surface of the moon – some think he should have stayed there, too

Peter Malinauskas and Anthony Albanese walk through a corrugated iron tunnel outdoors wearing high-vis and helmets, outside at the Whyalla steelworks

Resources

Steely plan

What next for Whyalla now the SA government has put Sanjeev Gupta’s steelworks into administration?

Art dealer Peter Gant waiting to cross the street outside the Victorian Supreme Court, in a suit and open short, chewing a fingernail.

Society

Frame of mind

The overturned convictions regarding allegedly faked Brett Whiteley paintings provide a lesson in how we tend to evaluate justice in accordance with our personal judgements

Kaitlyn Dever as Belle in Apple Cider Vinegar

Television

Netflix's Belle Gibson drama ‘Apple Cider Vinegar’

Plus, new seasons of ‘The White Lotus’ and ‘Severance’, and Demi Moore’s award-winning turn in ‘The Substance’

Podcasts  Right arrow

7am

The election budget: What's in it for you?

Columnist for The Saturday Paper Paul Bongiorno on what’s in the budget for you — and how it will sway the government’s chances at re-election.

HOST Ruby Jones
GUEST Paul Bongiorno

7am

The end of the Gaza ceasefire

Middle East correspondent for The Economist Gregg Carlstrom on what the end of the ceasefire means for the people of Gaza – and what US President Donald Trump wants out of the next stage of war.

HOST Ruby Jones
GUEST Gregg Carlstrom

7am

‘The gangsters have gone f*cking nowhere’: The failed clean up of the CFMEU

Associate editor of The Saturday Paper, Martin McKenzie-Murray, on the union members fighting back – and whether the CFMEU can be saved.

HOST Daniel James
GUEST Martin McKenzie-Murray