Description
The recollections of Australia’s leading public intellectual.
Robert Manne is one of Australia’s most profound political analysts. His memoir traces his intellectual roots, revealing how his family background and early years informed the questions he would spend his life trying to answer. It also provides a fascinating portrait of key political controversies, including intellectual combat over Pol Pot, Wilfred Burchett, Quadrant, the Stolen Generations, Manning Clark, the Howard government, the Murdoch press and much more.
During the Cold War and the culture wars, Manne clashed with some of the most influential thinkers, writers and polemicists – Noam Chomsky, Les Murray, Leonie Kramer, Tom Keneally, Isi Leibler, Helen “Demidenko” Darville, Peter Craven, Paddy McGuinness, Keith Windschuttle and Andrew Bolt. This memoir recounts with surprising and unknown detail what really happened and why.
Often subverting conventional notions of left and right, Manne is an original thinker who has helped shape the nation’s discourse for decades. This is the inside story of a life of engagement and reflection, and a book for anyone interested in the shape and meaning of the past nearly fifty years of politics.
Specifications:
Publisher: Black Inc Books / La Trobe University Press
Year: 2024
Format: Hardback
Pages: 496
ISBN: 9781760645069
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Peter Lindenmayer –
For anyone interested in the political and cultural controversies in Australia over the last 50 or so years, this makes fascinating reading. Manne writes well, exploring both the background to and principles of his thinking and writing. He is frank about his mistakes, but also forthright in identifying his critics and opponents, and pointing out their weaknesses. Yes, this is one person’s account, and no doubt there will be other perspectives, but I found Manne’s explanations generally convincing, and he comes across as a likeable, humane, thoughtful and deeply principled man, with a skin thick enough to withstand the many barbs hurled at him over the years.