Conversations

After feeling burnt out, Jackie Carpenter spontaneously applied for NASA's Space Camp. She was the first Australian accepted, and it was the most transformative experience of her life

Julia Baird has been sustained through hard times by acts of "moral beauty". In a world marked by division, these gestures have the power to restore our shared humanity

Dr Robert Waldinger on what it takes to live a happy life 

The hardship, cruelty and loneliness of the mission system during the Great Depression didn't crush Aunty Ruth Hegarty's spirit. She found her voice, God and her family. In 1929 during the Great Depression, Ruth Hegarty travelled with her mother and grandparents to Barambah, later known as Cherbourg Aboriginal Mission. After being told someone there would help them find a new home, they soon disco...

After a life of controversy, crime and corruption, disgraced former police detective Roger Rogerson died last week, aged 83. Peter Hoysted met with Rogerson on several occasions

Louise Pryke is one of few people in the world who can read the ancient language in which The Epic of Gilgamesh is written. The mammoth, wild tale is still being deciphered from thousands of clay tablets

Dr Liz Allen is a demographer fascinated by Australia's demographic trends. But her own story is a remarkable case study in deviating from the norm 

Nancy Withers has been breeding and training kelpies for 50 years, but one dog stands out from the rest, and he changed her life forever

These are just some of the remarkable and quirky people who helped write the Oxford English Dictionary

At 19 years old Jane Perlez visited China in the middle of the Cultural Revolution. She would return there as a journalist decades later to cover the biggest story of the 21st century

In 1927 Francis Birtles set off on a grand adventure from London to Melbourne, through murderous mountain ranges and blustering blizzards, in a Bean motorcar

International Chess Master and champion Irina Berezina credits her incredible chess-trained mind with helping her survive multiple international disasters

Costa is the friendly face of Gardening Australia, a devotee of composting, keeping chickens and developing insect hotels (R).

Dean Laws was in his 50s when doctors told him he had Parkinson's disease. For a time, he was devastated. Then he formed a running crew with his friends called 'The Dean Team', and made a plan to run the Sydney Marathon

Some years ago, Karin Bäumler found herself in a fight for her life after being diagnosed with ovarian cancer. In the thick of it all, making music was a refuge

Amar Singh's sense of belonging to Australia has only grown since he leant into his Sikh faith, growing out his beard and his hair, wearing a turban and committing himself to the service of his entire community

Voyager frontman Danny Estrin on his unconventional path from heavy metal to law and the Eurovision grand final 

Former top Detective Deb Wallace with ingenious and surprising stories from her working life smashing criminal gangs in Sydney

For 25 years Sandy wondered what became of the little yellow dinghy he left in Romania, after a months-long voyage from the UK. Could it still be waiting for him the marshes of the Danube Delta, ready for another adventure?

Melissa Lucashenko was a motorcycle detailer, a house painter, a prison advocate, and a game show contestant before finding her way as a writer

The actor and author thinks that nowhere in the world is the English language more poetic, colourful and persuasive than here in Australia William McInnes is a much-loved Australian actor and an author, whose books often recall his childhood in Queensland. It was there, in Redcliffe, that William became fluent in the peculiar, funny and colourful words and phrases unique to Australian English. Ove...

Alecia Simmonds with tales from a time in Australia's legal history when the jilted and broken-hearted could sue for redress in the courts 

Tom Holland on the glories, bloodshed and barbarianism of the golden days of the Roman Empire

Antony Penrose grew up knowing little about his remarkable mother Lee Miller, who had studied with Man Ray in Paris, and become a model, a photographer, and a war correspondent. But then an unexpected find in the family attic changed everything

Lucy Godoroja deals in the business of buttons, and the stories each button carries with it from Bohemia, or Milan to her shop in Sydney, and then into the hands of passers-by