The Australian Literary Review (published in today's Australian) today runs my piece on the controversy about whether plays are literature. Basically it's an overview of the recent debate that was sparked by the missing play at the NSW Premier's Literary Awards. Speaking of which, the debate has reached the UK, where my charming colleague (and he is - he bought me dinner so I know) David Jays ponders the same question on the Guardian's Stage blog.

While you're at it, check out Andrew Haydon's post on Postcards from the Gods where he talks about the implications of casting - racially, class-wise, aesthetically. It's a huge topic that sparks a concomitantly long reflection, and is well worth the read.

And don't miss either 2010 Pascall Prize winner Mark Mordue's meditation on contemporary criticism on his blog The Basement Tapes (which I thoroughly recommend). "Great criticism is about love more than hate, construction more than destruction... in many ways what a good critic does is nearer to the task of a translator who has found a way of channeling one form of language into another... I’d be so bold as to claim a great critic can, and should be a responsive poet, balancing judgment and empathy in an art of evocation." Well, I'm bound to say amen to that...