Laura Elizabeth Woollett’s The Love of a Bad Man begins with tenderness: ‘Baby, wake up,’ he says, and he’s kissing my eyelids, my cheeks, trailing his fingers over the bib of my nightgown and it’s so soft it must be a dream. Woolett’s short-story collection focuses on the lives of twelve women (or in the…
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This is the first instalment of binge, Cin Peeler’s new film and tv column for Lip. Check back regularly for reviews of the best feminist flicks, underrated tv shows, and hidden gems available to binge-watch at your leisure. Trying to convince my friends to watch a new TV show is like getting small children to…
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Girl Asleep is a colourful and creative film about leaving childhood behind. Set in 1970s suburban Australia, the film is a visual delight, and a clever representation of the confusing and somewhat terrifying experience of being a teenager. 14-year-old Greta Driscoll (Bethany Whitmore) has just moved house and started a new school. She meets Elliott…
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‘Becoming Bette’ is a one-woman show by artist and performer Elizabeth Scales. Hailing from Brisbane, she brings her show to Melbourne for a pre-Fringe festival viewing. Held at the Butterfly Club across the weekend of the 10th and 11th of September, Scales’ viewing was a cozy and intimate one. The show is a semi-autobiographical story…
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The lone, brilliant man is the archetype in film I find the most groan-inducing. Spanning all genres, the lone, brilliant man can be the action hero who saves the world before time runs out, the only genius in the world who can crack the case, or the innovative creator of a technological advancement that changes…
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Wouldn’t it be wonderful if schools taught mapping using paintings and stories instead of drab contour lines? In her latest memoir, aptly named Position Doubtful – mapping landscapes and memories, artist and award-winning author Kim Mahood masterfully paints rich Australian landscapes and people. She paints using pigments. She paints with narratives. The book’s title takes…
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So Sad Today is a book of personal essays by Melissa Broder, detailing her struggles with addiction, anxiety, panic disorder, relationships and an overwhelming fear of death. The book originated from an anonymous Twitter account of the same name in 2012, tweeting about the human condition in catchy one-sentence bites that were in equal parts…
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If you’re anything like me when it comes to talking 16th Century monarchs, I’m sure we’re all familiar with the glorified images provided to us by Hollywood and the likes. I just assume there’s a lot of velvet and feasting going on, mixed in with a whole bunch of inequality towards all minorities, specifically women….
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Lip Reading is a column about the books in our lives. Each month, Lip staff and writers share what books have obsessed, delighted, or even saddened them. What have you been reading? We’d love to hear your recommendations. — Donna Lu, Books & Literature Editor * Amy Nicholls-Diver I recently finished The Vegetarian, by Han Kang (translated…
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Geraldine Brophy, actress, playwright and author of The Viagra Monologues, says of her recent foray into the male mind: ‘Parenthood, marriage, celibacy, puberty, virginity, are all complex things that influence human experience, for better or for worse. They are common human experiences, not the province of any gender.’ This notion regarding the experiential equivalence of…
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Mother’s Ruin: A Cabaret about Gin is a riotous journey through the history of gin and its associations with the most scandalous of women. Once the scourge of the masses, now drink du jour, gin is an unlikely but surprisingly entertaining topic for a cabaret. Performed by Maeve Marsden and Libby Wood, under the direction…
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#FirstWorldWhiteGirls is a light-hearted cabaret that satirises that special group of people who live for hashtags, Tiffany’s, and fifteen minutes of fame. Brisbanites Judy Hainsworth and Kaitlin Oliver Parker have brought their #totallyOTT characters Tiffany and Kendall to Melbourne as part of the Melbourne Cabaret Festival. The characters (a trust fund princess and Anna Nicole…
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This is a review of a session held at the 2016 Sydney Writers’ Festival. * It’s not often that you’re able to sit in a room filled with proudly self-proclaimed feminists, listening to a panel of admirable and notable female authors, thinkers and activists describe exactly why you should have the right to rule the…
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Burnt Rotis, With Love is a bold collection of 54 poems by Prerna Bakshi. The collection deals with powerful themes of poverty, patriarchy, and oppression. Many of the poems focus on issues particular to India—Partition, the caste system, and the specific environment of Indian domestic life—but even these poems have roots in universally recognisable struggles…
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