Literature and writing | National Library of Australia (NLA)

Literature and writing

Showing 13 - 24 of 79 results
Zoe Smith, an NLA Scholar, sitting at a table in the Main Reading Room with a pile of books and smiling

2024 National Library Scholar Zoe Smith in the Main Reading Room

Uncovering the voices that shaped cultural understandings of domestic violence

Learn about the research of 2024 National Library Scholar Zoe Smith and what she found during her time at the Library.

Blog
A sepia group photo of the 10 young men in the Nowra softball team, including Frank Moorhouse. Photo-shopped onto the photo on the bottom right corner is a purple circle with white writing reading 'Friends event'

Frank Moorhouse [middle front], 1954, courtesy Matthew Lamb.

Author talk: Frank Moorhouse: Strange Paths with Matthew Lamb

The Friends of the National Library invited biographer Matthew Lamb to discuss young Frank Moorhouse's life.

Event
Collection guide
White Collection

Personal papers of Patrick White, plus letters from White to other Australian writers acquired as part of their papers. Also papers of White's biographer David Marr and those of the artist and theatre designer Desmond Digby who had a long friendship with White.

Collection guide
Four photographs of people smiling. Two of the photographs are of women and two are of men.
Memory to manuscript: Publishing family stories

Authors Tess Scholfield-Peters, André Dao and Sam Vincent, in conversation with broadcast journalist Virginia Haussegger

Event
Video
A pile of children's books
Creative storytelling

Module

This resource aligns to the Australian Curriculum for Year 3 English - Language, Literature and Literacy.

Digital Classroom
The front pages of two different Turkish language newspapers.

Left: Kaynak : the Australian Turkish source : independent Turkish newspaper, 15 February 1984, page 1, nla.gov.au/nla.cat-vn1031341. Right: Kimligimiz icin dusunce, August 1989, page 1, nla.gov.au/nla.cat-vn2206702

Turkish-Australian transnational life writing with Dr Burcu Cevik-Compiegne

Dr Burcu Cevik-Compiegne presented a lecture on her 2024 National Library Fellowship research into uncovering different forms of life writing produced in Australia following the Labour Migration Scheme between Turkey and Australia in 1967.

Event
Video
Two women looking down at something out of frame. One is wearing a pink shirt and one is wearing a blue shirt.

Helen Garner and Drusilla Modjeska, image courtesy of Drusilla Modjeska.

Mining Modjeska’s archive with Dr Bernadette Brennan

Dr Bernadette Brennan presented a lecture on her 2024 National Library Fellowship research into the archives of award-winning author and editor Drusilla Modjeska.

Event
Video
bronze cast of Henry Lawson's hand

Nelson Illingworth, Cast of Henry Lawson's hand, ca. 1922 [realia], nla.gov.au/nla.obj-139632985

The poet of Australia

Topic

Henry Lawson is celebrated as one of Australia’s greatest poets. The Library’s collection of Henry Lawson realia helps contemporary Australians understand Lawson’s popularity in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. 

Digital Classroom
Book cover with blue text reading 'The Snow Wombat' and an illustration of a wombat walking through snow on a bright cloudless day

Susannah Chambers, The snow wombat, 2016, nla.cat-vn7049949

What to read this winter

Get some winter book recommendations to suit all reading moods.

Blog
Smiling woman with short black hair and a fringe sitting at a table where several black and white photos of a woman are spread out
Researching a biography of scriptwriter and playwright Eleanor Witcombe

Learn about the fascinating career of Eleanor Witcombe with 2023 National Library Fellow and biographer Eleanor Hogan.

Blog
interior - stacks legal deposit crime magnifying glass
Arresting scenery: Capturing time and place in crime fiction writing

Explore some of the crime-fiction reads in the collection and how they can help readers learn more about Australian culture, history and place.

Blog
In the foreground, spiky lizards climbing a broken computer, and in the background a large imposing red structure in front of a pink sky

Detail from cover of Aurealis Magazine, Issue 7, nla.cat-vn427048

The end of the world at the Library: Sci-Fi, dystopia, and Australian fiction

Explore some of the speculative fiction reads in the collection and how they can help future generations understand society in the time they were written.

Blog

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