The August 2020 issue of Writers in Conversation is now available and is the final episode in a seven-year journey celebrating creative literature, but all is not lost with back copies of this international resource to remain available online.

Included in the current issue are interviews with Indian poets Kalyani Thakur Charal, Raphael D’Abdon and Kavita Ezekiel Mendonca, brought to readers by the indefatigable Jaydeep Sarangi and his colleagues. Eamonn Wall interviews the Irish novelist E.M. (Elizabeth) Reapy. Writers in Conversation co-editor Nick Turner’s conversation with British novelist and journalist AN Wilson rounds out the contemporary offerings.

Over the past few issues, editor Dr Gillian Dooley and team have been mining the archives of Australian print journals and republishing intriguing conversations found. In this issue, Professor Dorothy Driver has unearthed two interviews with the great South African writer Bessie Head which were conducted during her 1984 visit to Australia. Professor Driver has written a substantial introduction and produced new editions of these interviews, in one case going back to the original recording to check the transcription, in a major contribution to scholarship.

With the decision to draw Writers in Conversation to a close, its editors thank all contributors and supporters of the journal.

“It has been a most enjoyable journey, with a new batch of fascinating interactions appearing regularly every six months over the past seven years,” say Dr Dooley and Mr Turner. “But one’s time, energy and capacity are not infinite, and we have decided the time has come to give priority to other projects.”

The fourteen issues of the journal, containing nearly 100 interviews, will remain freely available online. The most recent eight on this site and the first six issues archived at Flinders Academic Commons.