Writers in Conversation

Welcome to the August 2020 issue of Writers in Conversation.

Included in this issue are interviews with Indian poets Kalyani Thakur Charal, Raphael D'Abdon and Kavita Ezekiel Mendonca, brought to us by the indefatigable Jaydeep Sarangi and his colleagues. Eamonn Wall interviews the Irish novelist E.M. (Elizabeth) Reapy, and WiC co-editor Nick Turner's conversation with the British novelist and journalist A.N. Wilson rounds out the contemporary offerings.

Over the past few issues, we have been mining the archives of Australian print journals and republishing particularly interesting conversation we have found there. In this issue, we are absolutely delighted that Dorothy Driver has unearthed two interviews with the great South African writer Bessie Head which were conducted during her 1984 visit to Australia. Dorothy has written a substantial introduction and produced new editions of these interviews, in one case going back to the original recording to check the transcription. The result is a major contribution to scholarship, and we are very proud to be publishing it.

We have decided that the time has come to draw Writers in Conversation to a close. We would like to thank all the contributors and supporters of the journal. It has been a most enjoyable journey, with a new batch of fascinating interactions appearing regularly every six months over the past seven years. But one's time, energy and capacity are not infinite, and we have decided the time has come to give priority to other projects. The fourteen issues of the journal, containing nearly 100 interviews, will remain freely available online, the most recent eight on this site and the first six issues archived at Flinders Academic Commons.