I don’t suppose Rosemary Sorensen could have continued forever at ABR’s desk. All the same, I believe she has manoeuvred the journal into a liveliness other magazines lacked. It’s a cheerful thing to see the ABR flourishing, its covers in the public face in newsagents about the country: something that few other literary review journals have managed to do, outside their city of origin. Try, for example, to get a copy of Southerly, Westerly, Northern Perspective, Island, LiNQ or Imago across the counter anywhere outside their states of origin.

The unavailability (an entirely different matter from the existence) of such journals is a worry, for lots of reasons. One of these comes poignantly home to me in my role as rueful chairperthing of the New England Writers’ Centre. In its first year of operation the Centre has sought to do what other writers’ centres do – extend seminars, readings, workshops, and consultancies across a geographical area about the size of Tasmania. The nearest comparable opera­tor in this respect is Wagga Wagga.