Published 18 June 2009 · Main Posts Guy Rundle launches Killing Jeff Sparrow On the subject of book launches, the details of mine are below: Guy Rundle launches Killing: Misadventures in Violence by Jeff Sparrow 6 for 6:30pm Thursday 16 July Bella Union Bar, Trades Hall HOW HARD IS IT TO KILL, AS A HUNTER ON A KANGAROO CULL, AS A WORKER IN! AN ABBATOIR, AS AN EXECUTIONER IN A PRISON, AS A SOLDIER AT WAR? Ninety years after World War I, police in a Victorian country town uncover the mummified head of a Turkish soldier, a bullet-ridden souvenir brought home from Gallipoli by a returning ANZAC. The macabre discovery sets Jeff Sparrow on a quest to understand the nature of deadly violence. How do ordinary people – whether in today’s wars or in 1915 – learn to take a human life? How do they live with the aftermath? These questions lead Sparrow through history and across Australia and the USA, talking to veterans and slaughtermen, executioners and writers about one of the last remaining taboos. Compassionate, engaged and political, Killing takes us up close to the ways society kills today, meditating on what violence means, not just for perpetrators but for all of us. Jeff Sparrow is the co-author of Radical Melbourne: A Secret History and Radical Melbourne 2: The Enemy Within, and the author of Communism: A Love Story, wh! ich was shortlisted for the 2007 Colin Roderick Award. He is the editor of the Australian literary journal Overland and writes regularly for Crikey. Jeff Sparrow Jeff Sparrow is a writer, editor, broadcaster and Walkley award-winning journalist. He is a former columnist for Guardian Australia, a former Breakfaster at radio station 3RRR, and a past editor of Overland. His most recent book is a collaboration with Sam Wallman called Twelve Rules for Strife (Scribe). He works at the Centre for Advancing Journalism at the University of Melbourne. More by Jeff Sparrow › Overland is a not-for-profit magazine with a proud history of supporting writers, and publishing ideas and voices often excluded from other places. If you like this piece, or support Overland’s work in general, please subscribe or donate. Related articles & Essays 20 March 20262 April 2026 · Main Posts Final results of the 2025 Judith Wright Poetry Prize Editorial team Established in 2007 and supported by the Malcolm Robertson Foundation, the Overland Judith Wright Poetry Prize seeks outstanding poetry from new and emerging writers. This year’s judges, Shastra Deo, Harry Reid and […] 20 March 202620 March 2026 · Main Posts Final results of the 2025 Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize Editorial team Established in 2007 and supported by the Malcolm Robertson Foundation, the Overland Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize seeks outstanding original short fiction of up to 3000 words themed loosely around the notion […]
