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In this episode of Fully Lit Live, we present The Critics Report, an event hosted by the Sydney Review of Books at the State Library of NSW in December 2025.
Moderated by SRB deputy editor Tiffany Tsao, the conversation brings together critics, editors and scholars to assess a year that placed unprecedented pressure on Australian arts and cultural institutions — and on the artists and writers who depend upon them.
Australia’s 2025 Venice Biennale entrants and Martu writer Karen Wyld, along with journalist Antionette Lattouf, all felt the impact of efforts to set the boundaries of acceptable expression.
What are the longer-term effects of these cultural eruptions? And with “social cohesion” high on the political agenda, how might the arts respond? What can the arts tell us about what makes a society cohere in the first place?
(Note that our panel took place before Adelaide Writers’ Week imploded, an event that suggests these questions remain urgent, and before the happy news that QUT had stepped up to rescue Meanjin.)
The discussion ranges over other important questions, including the role of government and universities as cultural funders, the potential impacts of AI on the arts, and the strain placed on literary journals and critics asked to defend culture while also keeping it alive.
Host
Tiffany Tsao is Deputy Editor of the Sydney Review of Books. She is a novelist, translator and critic whose work has appeared in major Australian and international publications. Alongside her editorial work at the SRB, she has published multiple novels and is widely recognised for her literary translations from Indonesian to English.
Guests
Daniel Browning is a Bundjalung and Kullilli writer, journalist and radio broadcaster, and Professor of Indigenous Cultural and Creative Industries at the University of Sydney — a newly established leadership role within the School of Art, Communication and English. He is a former presenter of The Art Show and Arts in 30 on ABC Radio National.
Nicholas Croggan is an art historian and critic, and Public Programs Coordinator at the Power Institute at the University of Sydney. He completed his PhD in Art History at Columbia University, New York.
Roanna Gonsalves is editor of Southerly, Australia’s oldest literary journal, and a Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing at UNSW Sydney. She is the author of The Permanent Resident (UWAP), and her novel The Servants will be published in November 2026.
James Jiang is Editor of the Sydney Review of Books. Prior to joining the SRB, he was Assistant Editor at Griffith Reviewand Australian Book Review. He holds a PhD in Modernist Literature from the University of Cambridge and has taught in the English and Theatre Studies Program at the University of Melbourne.
Credits
Fully Lit is brought to you by Impact Studios at UTS, the Sydney Review of Books, and the UTS Writing and Publishing Program, and is produced by Regina Botros.
Executive Producer: Sarah Gilbert.
Mixed by Siobhan Moylan.
Find more episodes of Fully Lit wherever you get your podcasts.
