Conversations

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Why Colm Toibin ran away with the circus — to Barcelona, Brooklyn and beyond May 29, 2025

Show notes

The Irish novelist has always been open to where life can unexpectedly take him, and the excitement that comes with that kind of freedom.

Colm Toibin's first big move was from rural Ireland to Dublin after his father died when he was young.

Then, it was off to experience the wild hedonism and sexual liberation of post-Franco Spain, a pleasant shock after needing a prescription to buy condoms in Ireland.

Since then, he's journeyed to Sudan, Los Angeles, New York and beyond.

Wherever Colm goes, he keeps a running list in his head of tiny details — observations of seemingly mundane encounters, an offhand comment or the cut of a lady's suit on a train.

Every now and then, these details bubble up in Colm's memory and another of his well-loved novels, like Brooklyn, Nora Webster or The Master, is born.

This episode was produced by Meggie Morris. Conversations Executive Producer is Nicola Harrison. Presented by Sarah Kanowski.

It explores film adaptations, death of a parent, grief, Ireland, homophobia, growing up gay, Catholicism, epic adventure, John Crowley, Nick Hornby, Saoirse Ronan, Domhnall Gleeson, Julie Walters, Dublin, immigrant experience, the Irish immigrant experience, family separation, origin stories, falling in love, books, writers, novels, life-story, family dynamics, reflection, loss, funny, comedy, repression, orgies, condom prescriptions, journalism, foreign correspondents.

Colm's latest novel Long Island is published by Pan MacMillan.

He was in Australia as a guest of the Wheeler Centre, RMIT, Melbourne Writers Festival and Sydney Writers Festival.

To binge even more great episodes of the ‘Conversations podcast’ with Richard Fidler and Sarah Kanowski go the ABC listen app (Australia) or wherever you get your podcasts. There you’ll find hundreds of the best thought-provoking interviews with authors, writers, artists, politicians, singers, psychologists, musicians, and celebrities.

Hilde Hinton's home for the temporarily defeated May 28, 2025

Show notes

When Hilde Hinton was on the cusp of adolescence, her mother died. For years she protected her younger siblings from the truth about their mum.

Despite the great grief of her mother's shocking death when Hilde was just 12 years old, there was also a sense of relief for Hilde.

She shielded her younger siblings, Samuel and Connie Johnson, from the truth of how and why their mother died.

But when Connie also died, decades later of cancer, Hilde was propelled into writing her first novel, in between shifts as a prison officer.

Her debut book, The Loudness of Unsaid things, was intensely autobiographical.

While Connie never got to read the book, Hilde's brother Samuel finally 'met' their mother through Hilde's writing, and learned all that his big sister had done for them growing up.

Now, from her home in Melbourne, where people who need solace freely come and go, Hilde explores in her writing the ordinary things that make life extraordinary.

This episode was produced by Meggie Morris. Conversations Executive Producer is Nicola Harrison. Presented by Richard Fidler.

This episode of Conversations explores mental health, suicide, grieving, grief, death, mothers, single fathers, bipolar, mothers with mental health issues, mental health hospitals, institutionalisation, prisons, writing, books, novels, siblings, Love Your Sister, nuns, Australian Story, childhood cancer.

Further information

The Opposite of Lonely is published by Hachette.

You can watch the episode of Australian Story, which features Hilde's brother, Samuel Johnson, online at ABC iview.

The secret life of Scarlett, the octopus May 27, 2025

Show notes

When Alex Schnell was around 5 years old, playing in rock pools around Clovelly beach in Sydney, she had an alien encounter.

The creature in the shallow water in front of her was a little octopus and unlike anything Alex had seen before, and instead of darting off in fear like a fish might, to Alex it felt like the octopus was genuinely curious in her.

Alex has now spent many hours observing them in the ocean, and has discovered extraordinary things about octopus intelligence, personalities, feats of memory, and mating behaviours.

The episode of Conversations explores animal intelligence, octopus, giant cuttlefish, scuba diving, animal memory and cognitive skills, South America, prisons in Chile, National Geographic, Nat Geo, Paul Rudd, nature doco, documentary, Disney, how smart are octopus.

Further information

You can stream Dr Alex Schnell's nature documentary, Secrets of the Octopus, at National Geographic Online.

Encore: How Sean Sweeney found his deaf heart May 23, 2025

Show notes

Sean Sweeney on the complications and joys of growing up as a a hearing child in a deaf family, using Auslan, a distinctively Australian sign language.

In his twenties, Sean rebelled against the deaf world, and began to look for a new life in the hearing one.

But after eighteen years, he returned. He found work as an interpreter at TAFE, and he met his future wife.

In 2019, Sean became well known for interpreting from English to Auslan for Australia's Rural Fire Service during Australia's Bushfire Emergency.

The episode of Conversations explores family, Auslan, interpreting, bushfire emergency, family, CODA

The miserable lives and golden guns of tyrants, dictators and despots May 22, 2025

Show notes

Marcel Dirsus is fascinated by the treadmill of tyranny: how dictators gain power, how they stay there and how they fall. This is his blueprint for bringing an end to authoritarianism.

With democracies seemingly faltering worldwide, political scientist and writer Marcel Dirsus is putting tyrants under the microscope to better understand how they rise and how they fall.

Years ago, Marcel took a break from his university studies and travelled to central Africa, where he took a job in a brewery.

One day, while walking to work, he heard shots fired and an explosion in the distance as the military was launching a coup.

The experience terrified him, and drew him into a study of tyrants — the dictators and despots who make life miserable for so many people on the planet.

While they project an image of strength, guarded on all sides, and surrounded by people who do their bidding, Marcel says they live in fear.

For the road to power is often flanked by the road to revolution.

These men know a mass uprising, an assassination, a mutiny or a foreign invasion could end their reign at any moment, and who, or what will take their place?

In investigating the long history of tyrannical leaders, however, Marcel has found a renewed optimism for Western Democracy.

How Tyrants Fall: And How Nations Survive is published by Hachette Australia.

Marcel is appearing at the Sydney Writers' Festival on Friday 23 May.

This episode of Conversations explores Putin, Xi Jinping, China, CCP, Russia, Trump, global politics, dictatorships, democracy, voting rights, election results, the new world order, Stalin, Hitler, famous leaders, Churchill, politics, books, writing, history, war, civil war, Africa, USSR, Elon Musk, Gaddafi, golden gun, torture, Libya, Syria, control, Machiavelli, monarchs, Al-Ghazali, East Germany, Congo, academia, what to study at university, coup, the elite, power systems, Cold War, Bashar al-Assad, Ukraine, surveillance, Roman Empire.

Claire Keegan on bravery, writing and the single life May 21, 2025

Show notes

The bestselling Irish author grew up on a farm set on “50 acres on the side of a hill”. Growing up, she witnessed a harsh, misogynistic country that convinced her she would never marry. Claire shares what she has learned about writing from a litter of newborn piglets.

Her works Small Things Like These and Foster have both been made into movies.

Claire's stories often take place in the landscape where she grew up — the farms and small towns of Wexford in Southeast Ireland.

Claire was the youngest of six children, and when she was born their farmhouse had no running water and few books.

Instead, Claire fell in love with horses.

As a small child she would go to the wood with her brother, who was a lumberjack.

Amongst the chainsaws and workmen, little Claire would drive a harnessed horse from behind, to the roadside, to help clear the heavy trees.

And as she grew older, she developed a fierce determination to live life on her own terms.

This episode was produced by Alice Moldovan. Conversations Executive Producer is Nicola Harrison. Presented by Sarah Kanowski.

This episode of Conversations touches on marriage, Magdalene laundries, contraception, Ireland, Catholicism, big Irish families, horsemanship, starting brumbies, skewbald Connemara pony, New Orleans, writing, literary prizes, farms, personal stories, epic life stories, family dynamics, Cillian Murphy and modern history.

Further information

Listen to Sarah's interview with Queensland horseman, Ken Faulkner.

Peter Godwin's complicated loves, great losses and occasional wars May 20, 2025

Show notes

The writer had a complex relationship with his mother, whose professional reputation built a wall between them, but also saved his life more than once while working as a war correspondent.

Peter Godwin was born in Zimbabwe when the country was still under colonial rule.

His English mother was the only doctor for thousands of kilometres and early on, Peter realised that he came second to her patients.

When Peter was little, civil war broke out at home and so he was sent away to boarding school, and then conscripted by the army when he was still a teenager.

After his service, Peter became a journalist and while on the ground, his mother’s professional reputation saved his life more than once, including the time he was kidnapped while reporting in Somalia.

As he grew older, Peter came to see his mother in a new light, and he finally learned the real reason she and his father had emigrated to Africa in the first place.

This episode of Conversations explores PTSD, war correspondence, journalism, colonialism, the British Empire, Africa, Civil War, the United Kingdom, mothers and sons, the death of a sibling, grief, occupational hazards, mental health, grief, memoirs, biography, origin story, epic, adventure, conscription, boy soldiers.

Exit Wounds is published by Allen&Unwin.

Richard spoke with Peter's sister, Georgina Godwin, in 2022.

Treating anorexia by nourishing the heart May 16, 2025

Show notes

Psychiatrist Warren Ward treats patients who are severely ill with eating disorders. Understanding the mystery of human nature has driven him since he was a young doctor.

Warren Ward's patients are often critically ill with diseases like anorexia.

Warren says asking someone with anorexia to eat is like asking an arachnophobe to put their hand in a jar full of spiders.

As a psychiatrist, Warren uses psychotherapy to help his patients.

He encourages those with an eating disorder to approach their mental illness as one part of their whole self.

His interest in the mystery of human nature informed his study of philosophy, and led him to examine the love lives of philosophers.

Lovers of Philosophy is published by Ockham Publishing.

This episode of Conversations explores mental illness, bulimia, orthorexia, anorexia, EDs, Eating disorders, disordered eating, how to help a loved one with an eating disorder, psychology, psychiatry, philosophy, romance, heartbreak, love life, relationships, inpatient treatment, mental health hospitals, feeding clinics.

Ghost stories and executions in Iceland — when Hannah Kent and Agnes Magnusdottir became entwined May 15, 2025

Show notes

When writer Hannah Kent first visited Iceland in 2003, she came across a gothic true story about Agnes Magnusdottir, the last woman hanged in Iceland. That story would change her life.

Hannah's arrival to the Nordic island as an exchange student in 2003 was a difficult one.

On her first night in the country, she found herself stranded late at night at Keflavik Airport and desperately homesick.

But within weeks, Iceland had begun to change young Hannah — its dramatic landscapes, extraordinary light and chilling ghost stories embedded themselves in Hannah's psyche.

She became particularly entranced with the haunting story of accused murderer and domestic servant, Agnes Magnusdottir, who became the last person executed in Iceland.

Hannah's later novel, Burial Rites, was inspired by Agnes' story and became a best-seller. But there were many unsolvable mysteries that lingered in her mind years after that book was released.

Hannah returned to Iceland to find answers, and discovered her life was still entwined with Agnes in strange and eerie ways.

Always Home, Always Homesick is published by Pan Macmillan.

This episode of Conversations was recorded live at the 2025 Melbourne Writers Festival. It explores writing, books, Rotary Exchange, high school exchange, ERASMUS, Scandinavia, remote travelling, the northern lights, mountains, ghost stories, horrible histories, psychics, speaking with the dead, creepy coincidences, true stories, death penalty, execution, murder, crime.

Heroin addiction, Ivan Milat's dentist, and beginning again May 14, 2025

Show notes

Claude Robinson developed a heroin habit as a young man, and spent years in jail. In 2006 he began to turn his life around for good. (CW: descriptions of drug use, addiction, and crime) (R)

Claude Robinson is the manager of Rainbow Lodge, a home in inner Sydney for men just out of prison. Claude knows the place well because nearly 20 years ago he was sent there himself.

Claude was a heroin addict who had taken to crime to pay for his habit and wound up in a minimum security jail. But after he assaulted a prison guard, he ended up in one of Australia's toughest jails - Goulburn Correctional Centre.

While Claude was inside, his father died, and he found out that he had inherited $60,000.

It was a chance to start a new life when he got out of prison. But instead, he and a girlfriend checked into a hotel in Kings Cross and bought some backs of heroin. Within weeks, all of Claude's inheritance was gone.

In 2006, Claude was back in prison when he decided to finally change his story. He got off drugs, went to TAFE, and started working his way back to Rainbow Lodge, where he helps men who have walked a similar path to his own.

Help and support is always available:

The National Alcohol & Other Drug Hotline is a free and confidential 24/7 phone service that provides counselling, advice, and information for those struggling with addiction. Call 1800 250 015.

Learn more about Rainbow Lodge

Read about Australia's Justice Reform Initiative's campaign Jailing is Failing

This episode of Conversations discusses drug use, substance abuse, addiction, crime, mental health, toxic masculinity, manhood, fatherhood, parenting, turning your life around, getting clean, rehabilitation, rehab, intervention, AA, NA, sponsors, inheritance, heroin, methadone, ice, meth, illicit substances, incarceration, recidivism.

To binge even more great episodes of the Conversations podcast with Richard Fidler and Sarah Kanowski go the ABC listen app (Australia) or wherever you get your podcasts. There you’ll find hundreds of the best thought-provoking interviews with authors, writers, artists, politicians, psychologists, musicians, and celebrities.

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