# Event Details - **Event Name**: Polar Imaginaries and Combative Poetics: Australia’s Literary Cold War - **Event Start and End Date**: Thu, 20 Aug, 2026 at 08:00 am – Fri, 21 Aug, 2026 at 08:00 pm - **Event Description**: A Symposium examining mid-twentieth-century Australian literary cultures, especially realism and its political, social, and aesthetic stakesAbout this EventThe postwar decades saw a flourishing of small magazines, journals, writers’ groups, and publishing initiatives committed to representing the lives of working-class Australians. These efforts intersected with broader global ideological tensions, producing a charged literary field shaped by surveillance, censorship, and competing visions of culture and society.Polar Imaginaries and Combative Poetics brings together more than twenty scholars to discuss the literary cultures and conflicts of Australia’s Cold War. Bringing renewed attention to mid-twentieth-century realism and its political, social, and aesthetic stakes, the event will explore the vibrant cultural infrastructure of the organised left and its role in shaping Australian literary production.The in-person Symposium is hosted at UNSW Canberra City as part of an ARC Discovery Project led by Nicole Moore and Christina Spittel focused on the Australasian Book Society. The project aims to highlight the literary works, forms and lives produced by polarised forms of cultural infrastructure during Australia’s Cold War.The Symposium will be held across 2 days:Thursday 20 August from approx. 4pm - Keynote Speaker and Presentation by UNSW Rare Books Team (tbc)Friday 21 August - Full-day Symposium featuring 20 speakers. See below for a full agenda.The Symposium will primarily be held as an in-person event. However, a Microsoft Teams link can be sent for anyone wishing to attend remotely. Please contact Rebekah Ward at rebekah.ward@unsw.edu.au if you want to enquire about joining via Teams.A HDR/ECR Masterclass is currently being planned for Saturday 22 August to coincide with the Symposium.Registration is free for all parts of the event.AgendaMary BesemeresInfo: Enduring Illusions: Cognitive Dissonance, Regret in Australian Narratives of Parental StalinismGiacomo BianchinoInfo: The Whole World in Our Hands: The Australian Strike Novel in International PerspectiveMeg BrayshawInfo: Worldly Realism and Leftist Melodrama: Incompatible Genres in Dymphna Cusack’s Cold War FictionDavid CarterInfo: The Death of the Old World … The Birth of the New: Realism as Modern, Traditional, Nostalgic, Utopian, Sentimental, Mundane, Documentary, Revolutionary, Revisionist or …John ConnorInfo: The Battle for Socialist Realism in Britain and AustraliaPaul GillenInfo: Communism in 1950s Garment Factories: Dorothy Hewett’s Bobbin Up and Jack Lindsay’s Moment of Choice Doug JarvisInfo: First Wave Realism: Some Continuities into the Cold War PeriodAmanda LaugesenInfo: Creating an Australian Folk: Folklore in Australia and the Cold WarLi JianjunInfo: Ralph de Boissière’s China Tour and His Creative WritingBrigid Magner and Gerard StarlingInfo: ‘The dying down of a burned and blighted world’: John Morrison’s bushfire storiesDougal McNeilInfo: ‘E taku hoa, e Ron’: R.A.K. Mason, Hone Tuwhare, and Cold War FriendshipNicole MooreInfo: ASIO Files and Australian AuthorsAnnelise RobertsInfo: Imagining the impossible real: Disavowal and the task of the Writers Against Nuclear ArmsJeff SparrowInfo: A Path Not Taken: The After Life of Lesbia Harford’s Radical Modernism Christina SpittelInfo: The ABS and Seven Seas PublisherJaney Stone and Lisa MilnerInfo: Before Algorithms: Double Targeting the AudienceAmanda TinkInfo: Alan Marshall, Disability, and the Limitations of Australian Realist WritingHannah VineyInfo: 'Words to Use to Help a Neighbour Live’: How Dymphna Cusack and Aileen Palmer Explored Cold War Tensions Through WritingKatarzyna WilliamsInfo: A Fragile Archive: Gulag Memory and Silences in Postwar Australian Life Writing - **Event URL**: https://allevents.in/reid/polar-imaginaries-and-combative-poetics-australias-literary-cold-war/100001991437726849 - **Event Categories**: art, literary-art, workshops - **Interested Audience**: - total_interested_count: 0 - **Event Highlights**: - Duration: 12 hours - Location: UNSW Canberra City - Languages: English ## Ticket Details - **Ticket Price Range**: min: 0, max: 0, currency: AUD ## Event venue details - **city**: Reid - **state**: CT - **country**: Australia - **location**: UNSW Canberra City - **lat**: -35.2854013 - **long**: 149.1361472 - **full address**: UNSW Canberra City, 37 Constitution Avenue, Reid, Australia ## Event gallery - **Alt text**: Polar Imaginaries and Combative Poetics: Australia’s Literary Cold War - **Image URL**: https://dyn-image.allevents.in/generate-image?v=4&title=Polar+Imaginaries+and+Combative+Poetics%3A++Australia%E2%80%99s+Literary+Cold+War&date=Thu%2C+20+Aug%2C+2026+at+08%3A00+am&bg=5 ## FAQs - **Q**: When and where is Polar Imaginaries and Combative Poetics: Australia s Literary Cold War being held? - **A:** Polar Imaginaries and Combative Poetics: Australia s Literary Cold War takes place on Thu, 20 Aug, 2026 at 08:00 am to Fri, 21 Aug, 2026 at 08:00 pm at UNSW Canberra City, 37 Constitution Avenue, Reid, Australia. - **Q**: Who is organizing Polar Imaginaries and Combative Poetics: Australia s Literary Cold War? - **A:** Polar Imaginaries and Combative Poetics: Australia s Literary Cold War is organized by UNSW Canberra. - **Q**: Who is this event for? Is it right for me? - **A:** Polar Imaginaries and Combative Poetics: Australia s Literary Cold War is ideal for art lovers, collectors, creatives, and anyone inspired by visual arts, installations, and exhibitions. Whether you're a first-time attendee or a longtime enthusiast in Reid, this event is thoughtfully curated to deliver a standout experience worth every moment. If Polar Imaginaries and Combative Poetics: Australia s Literary Cold War sounds like your kind of event, don't wait - spots fill up fast. ## Structured Data (JSON-LD) ```json [ { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Event", "name": "Polar Imaginaries and Combative Poetics: Australia’s Literary Cold War", "image": "https://dyn-image.allevents.in/generate-image?v=4&title=Polar+Imaginaries+and+Combative+Poetics%3A++Australia%E2%80%99s+Literary+Cold+War&date=Thu%2C+20+Aug%2C+2026+at+08%3A00+am&bg=5", "startDate": "2026-08-20", "endDate": "2026-08-21", "url": "https://allevents.in/reid/polar-imaginaries-and-combative-poetics-australias-literary-cold-war/100001991437726849", "location": { "@type": "Place", "name": "UNSW Canberra City", "address": { "@type": "PostalAddress", "streetAddress": "37 Constitution Avenue", "postalCode": "2612", "addressLocality": "Reid", "addressRegion": "CT", "addressCountry": "AU" }, "geo": { "@type": "GeoCoordinates", "latitude": "-35.2854013", "longitude": "149.1361472" } }, "eventAttendanceMode": "https://schema.org/OfflineEventAttendanceMode", "description": "A Symposium examining mid-twentieth-century Australian literary cultures, especially realism and its political, social, and aesthetic stakes", "offers": [ { "@type": "AggregateOffer", "availability": "https://schema.org/InStock", "priceCurrency": "AUD", "availabilityStarts": "2026-09-05", "availabilityEnds": "2026-08-21", "validFrom": "2026-09-05", "lowPrice": "0.00", "highPrice": "0.00", "price": "0.00", "url": "https://allevents.in/reid/polar-imaginaries-and-combative-poetics-australias-literary-cold-war/100001991437726849" }, { "@type": "Offer", "availability": "https://schema.org/InStock", "priceCurrency": "AUD", "availabilityStarts": "2026-09-05", "availabilityEnds": "", "validFrom": "2026-09-05", "url": "https://allevents.in/reid/polar-imaginaries-and-combative-poetics-australias-literary-cold-war/100001991437726849", "price": 0, "name": "General Admission" } ], "organizer": [ { "@type": "Organization", "name": "UNSW Canberra", "url": "https://allevents.in/org/unsw-canberra/22574537", "description": "Working at the intersection of a leading university and a military academy, UNSW Canberra at the Australian Defence Force Academy has been educating defence leaders for over half a century.  UNSW Canberra graduates shape Australia, the region and the international community as leaders in defence, government, and industry." } ] } ] ```