Archive Fever
Clare Wright and Yves Rees
Archive Fever is a new Australian history podcast featuring intimate conversations with writers, artists, curators, fellow historians and other victims of the research bug. Each episode, co-hosts Clare Wright and Yves Rees talk to archive addicts about what kind of archives they use, how often they use them, when they got their first hit. Join us as we ask: what madness is this?
Episodes
Mentioned books
Sep 30, 2019 • 34min
05 | A White Glove Act
How do historical novelists mix research and imagination to bring stories to life? Do they get anxious about wading into academic turf? To investigate these questions, Clare and Yves chat to Jock Serong, award-winning novelist and author of Preservation—a captivating thriller based on the true story of a shipwreck in colonial Australia. Jock reflects on the archive of human character he encountered in his former life as a lawyer, shares tales of battling his editor over animal-skin water carriers, and confesses a secret love of Google Earth.
Sep 23, 2019 • 28min
04 | A Kid with a Lolly Jar
Clare and Yves are joined by Gwenda Tavan, Associate Professor of Politics at La Trobe University, and one of Australia’s foremost experts in the history and politics of immigration and multiculturalism. How do we find the human face of bureaucratic archives? Can researchers’ detective work impact lives and policies in the present? The group discuss the emotional and intellectual meanings of archives, consider the challenges of family gatekeepers, and reflect on the power and responsibility of archival access.
Sep 15, 2019 • 26min
03 | Inch by Inch
Clare and Yves are joined by author Chloe Hooper, whose latest book The Arsonist (2018) weaves together the story of the Black Saturday Fires out of the threads of a living archive. Can the landscape and its scars reveal a true history? The group discusses paper trails in the legal system, the question of trust, and engaging in the physical archive of landscape.
Sep 10, 2019 • 26min
02 | Looking for the Right Truck to Pass By
Clare and Yves are joined by author Chloe Hooper, whose latest book The Arsonist (2018) weaves together the story of the Black Saturday Fires out of the threads of a living archive. Can the landscape and its scars reveal a true history? The group discusses paper trails in the legal system, the question of trust, and engaging in the physical archive of landscape.
Sep 2, 2019 • 30min
01 | Archives Anonymous
Clare Wright and Yves Rees expose their archive addict underbellies, pay tribute to Jacques Derrida, the patron saint of Archive Fever, and share stories of catching the research bug. The first session of Archives Anonymous meets here, welcome to the group.
