Robert Phiddian is Professor of English at Flinders University. He teaches renaissance and eighteenth-century literature and has a special interest in political satire, parody and humour. He researches political satire, especially current Australian political cartoons with Haydon Manning. He is on the board of the Adelaide Festival of Ideas, and has particular interests both in the quality of public language and in writers’ festivals.
Books & arts
He’s not the Messiah
Robert Phiddian
23 May 2024
A former prime minister ponders providence
Books & arts
Born to laugh
Robert Phiddian
22 March 2024
Is British comedy pervaded by the worldview of the Oxbridge graduate?
Books & arts
Yes, it is funny
Robert Phiddian
5 September 2023
How the comic genius of John Clarke found its anchor
Essays & reportage
Petty’s golden thread
Robert Phiddian
12 April 2023
The brilliant cartoonist illuminated Australia as it is, and as it could be
Books & arts
The scalpel and the axe
Robert Phiddian
5 November 2021
Bill Leak’s biographer offers a sympathetic but unflinching account of the controversial cartoonist’s life
Books & arts
A year of living dangerously
Robert Phiddian
13 November 2020
Books| Like the rest of us, cartoonists lived through a gruelling year
Books & arts
Risky business
Robert Phiddian
4 January 2019
Books | A year of cartoons reveals almost as much about the media as it does about politics
Books & arts
Cartoonists go back to class
Robert Phiddian
7 June 2016
Books | A new collection of cartoons reveals a struggle to find the comic essence of Malcolm Turnbull, writes Robert Phiddian
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