Reading these books has forced me to articulate what I talk about when I talk about Labor: a commitment to collectivism, which manifests itself in union membership; that the free market won’t solve, let alone address, inequality; and a commitment to good quality public education at every local school and a class awareness applied to all that we do.

Not a month goes by in academia or in literary culture without a debate about Australia’s literary canon and calls for a more inclusive list. Undoubtedly our canon should include more voices from women, the LGBTI community and Indigenous Australians. But I’d like to throw forward another undervalued and underrepresented genre: women’s political agency and activism – and this year might be a good time to acknowledge it.