Fully Lit

In this episode of Fully Lit, we head to the Addi Road Writers’ Festival for a wide‑ranging conversation on masculinity, vulnerability, and the inner lives of men.
Writer Luke Carman is joined by George Haddad, author of Losing Face, and debut novelist Jet Williams to explore what it means to write — and read — men today.
From graffiti culture and underground urban exploration to questions of embodiment, intimacy and cultural expectation, the discussion moves between lived experience and literary form. Williams reflects on writing for readers who don’t usually pick up books, while Haddad speaks candidly about hospitality, identity and the complexities of masculinity within family and culture.
Together, they consider why art can still feel “embarrassing” for young men, the pressures of conformity, and the value of writing that resists easy answers. Along the way, they ask what it means to represent masculinity beyond crisis — and whether literature can offer something more honest, more expansive.
At its core, this is a conversation about connection: how we find language for difficult experiences, and how the most personal stories can resonate far beyond the self.
Voices
Luke Carman is a writer and author of An Elegant Young Man and Intimate Antipathies.
George Haddad is the author of Losing Face and winner of the Kill Your Darlings Creative Nonfiction Essay Prize.
Jet Williams is the author of Off the Rails, a debut novel exploring youth, subculture and identity.
Credits
This episode of Fully Lit was recorded at the Addi Road Writers’ Festival on Gadigal land in Sydney. Special thanks to Mark Mordue at the Addi Road Festival.
Fully Lit is brought to you by Impact Studios at UTS, the Sydney Review of Books, and the UTS Writing and Publishing Program.
Recorded my Maksim Voloshin-Cleary
Produced and edited by Regina Botros
Executive Producers: Sarah Gilbert and James Jiang

Scholar, insomniac, and accidental romantasy expert Olivia Murphy joins us to talk about the wildly popular adults-only genre that blends Mills & Boon-style romance with Game of Thrones-style world-building, and explore its cultural significance.
Olivia is an expert on the popular novel of the long 18th century. In this conversation she draws a direct line from the forgotten, formulaic, novels that formed the trashy foundations on which Jane Austen's masterpieces were built to the dragon-shifter billionaires and tiger-men with unusual appendages dominating today's bestseller lists — and makes a compelling argument for why we should take them seriously.
Olivia Murphy is the author of Jane Austen, the Reader and is currently working on an edition of Pride and Prejudice for an American publisher. You can read her essay "Who Did This To You? Olivia Murphy on BookTok and the Politics of Monster Fucking" at the Sydney Review of Books.
Voices
Olivia Murphy is the author of Jane Austen, the Reader and is currently working on an edition of Pride and Prejudice for an American publisher.
Sarah Gilbert is a writer and producer based in Sydney, and the author of Unconventional Women: the story of the last Blessed Sacrament Sisters in Australia. She is executive producer at UTS Impact Studios.
Credits
This episode of Fully Lit was made on Gadigal land in Sydney.
Fully Lit podcast 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 Producers: Sarah Gilbert and James Jiang.
Recorded and mixed by Regina Botros.
Further reading
'Who did this to you? Olivia Murphy on Booktok and the politics of monsterfucking', published by the Sydney Review of Books.

In this episode of Fully Lit, recorded live at Gleebooks in Sydney, we turn to one of the most formidable figures in Australian literature — Patrick White.
Nobel Prize–winning, fiercely private, and allergic to sentimentality, White remains both towering and divisive. But what does it mean to read him now?
Writer and translator Vrasidas Karalis joins journalist and biographer Helen Trinca for a searching conversation about White’s life, art and legacy. From the quiet, enduring presence of his lifelong partner Manoly Lascaris to White’s metaphysics, irony and suspicion of tidy plots, the discussion traces both the intimate and intellectual worlds that shaped his work.
They revisit the war years, White’s complicated “salvation” in Australia, his artistic obsessions, and the enduring challenge of adapting his novels for the screen.
Along the way, they reflect on why Voss, Riders in the Chariot and The Vivisector still feel urgent — and unsettling.
Patrick White distrusted comfort. He rejected easy narratives. He believed the novel should disturb rather than console.
So how do we read him in an age that prizes clarity, speed and reassurance?
Voices
Hosted by Giramondo publisher and friend of Antigone, Ivor Indyk, the event brought together:
Professor Vrasidas Karalis is a writer, translator and Professor of Modern Greek Studies at the University of Sydney. A prolific scholar of modern Greek literature, culture and cinema, he has published extensively on migration, identity and modernism. Karalis is also a leading interpreter of Patrick White’s work.
Helen Trinca is a journalist and literary biographer. She is the author of Madeleine: A Life of Madeleine St John and Looking for Elizabeth: The Life of Elizabeth Harrower.
Credits
The live event was presented by Giramondo Publishing.
This episode was recorded on Gadigal land at Sydney's Gleebooks - for more literary events see the Gleebooks events page.
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.
Edited and mixed by Siobhan Moylan & Regina Botros.
Executive Producers: Sarah Gilbert and James Jiang.
Find more episodes of Fully Lit wherever you get your podcasts.
Further reading
Karalis' On Patrick White's Dilemmas: A Personal Essay, is available at Gleebooks and other good booksellers.
Commemorative editions of the Poetry and Prose:
https://giramondopublishing.com/books/poetry-antigone-kefala/
https://giramondopublishing.com/books/fiction-antigone-kefala/

In this episode of Fully Lit Live, UTS alumni Judi Morison and Verity Borthwick join writer and academic Dr Claire Corbett to discuss their debut novels at the 2025 UTS Writers’ Festival.
Verity Borthwick’s Hollow Air is a psychological thriller set at a remote mining site in Far North Queensland, using isolation and an often-unseen industry to explore power, fear and uncertainty.
Judi Morison’s Secrets is a family saga spanning six decades, centred on a matriarch facing the end of her life — and a truth she has carried for sixty years — illuminating histories of incarceration, racism and intergenerational trauma.
The authors reflect on the importance of place in their storytelling, on isolation and truth-telling, and on the role UTS played in helping them develop their voices and navigate the path to publication. The episode also features readings from both novels.
Voices
Dr Claire Corbett is a writer, critic and lecturer in Creative Writing at UTS, where she teaches fiction and creative nonfiction. Her work spans literary criticism, essays and teaching, with a focus on contemporary literature, feminism and narrative form.
Judi Morison is a writer and UTS alumna whose debut novel Secrets is published by Bundyi, Simon & Schuster’s First Nations imprint.
Verity Borthwick is a writer and UTS alumna whose debut novel Hollow Air is published by Ultimo Press.
Recorded at The UTS Writers' Festival held on November 7, 2025, to celebrate books by UTS Creative Writing staff, alumni, and students.
Credits
Fully Lit podcast 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 Producers: Sarah Gilbert and James Jiang.
Mixed by Siobhan Moylan & Regina Botros.
Fully Lit is made on Gadigal land.
Further reading
Critical/Mineral - Roslyn Jolly on the Australian Mining novel, a review of Verity Borthwick's Hollow Air.

In this episode of Fully Lit Live, Felicity Castagna joins writer and producer Sheila Ngoc Pham for a wide‑ranging conversation about writing, class, place, and longevity in the arts.
The evening opens with poetry by Lebanese Australian multidisciplinary artist Charnel Rizk, whose work reflects on heritage, land, and survival. What follows is an expansive discussion tracing Felicity Castagna’s journey from early short story writing to award‑winning novels, teaching, and cross‑disciplinary creative work.
Together, Felicity and Sheila reflect on Australian literature, the decline of literary study in universities, and the changing role of reading communities outside academia. They explore the idea of “Western Sydney literature” — who it serves, where it falls short, and how writers can resist being pigeonholed while still honouring place and specificity.
The conversation also touches on class mobility, migrant identity, writing in dark political times, adaptation for stage and screen, and what it means to sustain a creative life over decades. Felicity shares insights into her upcoming novel Peaches, as well as her approach to teaching, collaboration, and staying creatively engaged beyond the book industry alone.
The event was hosted by writer Yumna Kassab.
The episode concludes with audience Q&A, considering creativity across disciplines, writing through rage and despair, and the value of slow, sustained artistic work.
This event was recorded at the Parramatta Literary Salon #4 on Wednesday 11 March, 2026, an Arts & Cultural Exchange, Parramatta event.

Voices
Felicity Castagna is a Sydney novelist, essayist, critic and teacher of creative writing. Her essays on books, art, suburbia, home and place are published both here and internationally on platforms such as The Sydney Review of Books, Electric Literature, LitHub, and ABC radio and television. When she’s not writing she spends most of her time talking about books and helping other people to write them. She’s taught everywhere from schools to festivals, art galleries and correctional centres and she has helped to establish, promote and run many writing and storytelling programs, particularly in Western Sydney. She is currently a Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing with The Writing and Society Research Centre at Western Sydney University.
Felicity has published four novels for adults and young adults including her most recent book, Girls In Boys’ Cars, which received The Victorian and Queensland Premier’s Literary Awards and is on its way to becoming a film. She is also the author of No More Boats, a finalist in the 2018 Miles Franklin Literary Awards, and The Incredible Here and Now, which won a Prime Minister’s Literary Award. Her next book, Peaches, will be released in 2027.
Sheila Ngọc Phạm is an independent Sydney writer, producer and researcher. She writes for a wide range of Australian and international publications, and her work has been recognised with listings in the 2023 Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize, 2021 Pascall Prize for Arts Criticism and 2021 Woollahra Digital Literary Award. She has produced radio and podcasts for Monocle, ABC Radio National and SBS; worked on screen-based projects and series; and curated exhibitions for the State Library of NSW and Fairfield City Museum and Gallery. Sheila was the inaugural Imago Fellow at the State Library of NSW, examining Australian speculative fiction in the late 20th century, and is currently a researcher of refugee health at the University of Technology Sydney.
Charnel Rizk is a Lebanese Australian multidisciplinary artist working across poetry, music, performance, theatre, and writing. She is the co‑owner of Parramatta Artists Studios and founder of the creative platform All The Rizk. Her writing has been featured on SBS and has received international attention. Charnelle is also a practicing speech therapist and is passionate about storytelling, identity, and community‑focused creative collaboration.
Credits
Fully Lit is made on the Gadigal lands of the Eora nation.
Sevan Dermelkonian recorded this episode at the Parramatta Literary Salon #4 on Wednesday 11 March, 2026 and is an Arts & Cultural Exchange, Parramatta event.
Fully Lit is brought to you by Impact Studios at UTS, the Sydney Review of Books and the UTS Writing and Publishing Program.
Producer: Regina Botros
Executive Producers: Sarah Gilbert and James Jiang
Find more episodes of Fully Lit wherever you get your podcasts.