Featuring an impressive line-up--including Tim Winton, David Malouf, Patrick White, Les Murray and Judith Wright--Literary Activists explores the role of literary writers in Australian public life. It opens by recalling a passionate speech David Marr delivered at Redfern Town Hall in 2003, in which he rallied for our writers to speak up and re-engage with politics. Rooney then proceeds to survey the various ways in which her chosen authors have stepped into the public spotlight, from Oodgeroo Noonuccal’s (Kath Walker’s) first book of poetry, We are Going, which contributed to the success of the 1967 referendum campaign, to the debates provoked by Helen Garner’s The First Stone. She raises a raft of questions around her central theme, such as how otherwise reclusive writers have come to front activist campaigns and what the potential career benefits may be, but I feel the book’s strongpoint lies in her insightful analysis of particular literary works rather than in a unifying argument. Although it deals with issues of broad cultural interest, Literary Activists is essentially a scholarly textbook for tertiary students of Australian literature and fails to address a readership beyond academia. Rooney is a Sydneybased academic, and this is her first book.

Sally Denmead is a freelance reviewer who has worked in publishing and as a bookseller

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