Dream bodies

This doctorate consists of a novel and an exegesis, which focus on the topic of intersex; children who are born with variant sex characteristics and the doctors who surgically intervene. The research reveals the deceit surrounding these practices and culminates in the first Australian novel to be written about intersex.

The fuzzboys

This doctoral thesis, comprising of a young adult novel and an accompanying exegesis, explores the experiences of young adults living in small towns, their pastimes and preoccupations, and their experimentation with sexuality and gender. Its depiction of alternative masculinities for young people challenges a normative, heterosexual framework of gender relations.

Bye, bye the Appler

This thesis, which consists of a novel and an exegesis comprising two related essays on the themes of motherhood and autism, explores the importance and relevance of fiction in representing the anguish, its causes and the unknowability of a mother and her (possibly) autistic child. The problems of language discovered in this relationship were found to intersect with parallel issues in the realm of creative writing.

Last supper

A creative reimagining of the life of Alexander Pearce (1790?-1824), the 'cannibal convict' of Van Diemen's Land, seeking a more historically accurate portrayal than the narrow stereotypes seen in literature, such as the brutish character Gabbett in Marcus Clarke's 1874 novel "For the term of his natural life." The critical exegesis surveys the literary tradition of the convict novel in Australia.

Eleven seasons : a creative writing journey through modern Australian football

This thesis offers a novel, 'Eleven seasons', that traces the physical and emotional journey of a young male footballer through the mid-1980s and mid-1990s. It also offers a comparative review of creative writing about Australian football, and a critical analysis of the book's creative gestation from idea to completed text.

The silence of the 7th floor

This thesis explored the conundrum of the trauma narrative requiring a suspension of disbelief from the reader, whilst simultaneously being acknowledged as bona fide truth. This paradox was examined via the identification of common themes and writerly techniques used in both trauma testimony and trauma novels.

Look who's morphing

This project's creative component is "Look who's morphing", a fiction collection that explores the theme of personal identity. The exegesis analyses an issue pertaining to the writer's creative process: what degree of directness was employed in the authorial identity in his creative work and how was this level of directness realised?

Concept of innocence in the thought of Simone Weil

Addresses common criticisms of Simone Weil's thought as both world-denying and as utopian or escapist. Considers Weil's life and examines her cosmology. Concludes that Weil's thought is in fact world and life affirming, and oriented towards living in the world.

Fictional endstates

Studies the intellectual in power striving to realise the universal State or Empire. Examines this theme through the medium of four fictional narratives: Yevgeny Zamyatin's We, Aldous Huxley's Brave new world, Arthur Koestler's Heart of darkness, and George Orwell's Nineteen eighty-four. The hypothesis of the inquiry is that all four of these texts provide fictional redescriptions of a crisis of confidence in the Enlightenment ideal of progress.

Gilles Deleuze : the problem of aesthetic constructions with case studies on the architectural projects of Louis Kahn

Analyses the late aesthetic writings of philosopher Gilles Deleuze, arguing that : Deleuze continuously refers to modern art and architecture as models of modernist thinking; his method can serve in the analysis and creation of architecture; this can be demonstrated through analysis of the work of architect Louis Kahn.

Only thin smoke without flame

Hardy's short stories have been relatively neglected by critics. This thesis argues for their reconsideration and proper recognition as essential components of Hardy's achievement. Examines his creation of a fictional "Wessex" with himself as conservator, but suggests that their subversive ideologies touching on modern themes, make him a "proto-modern" writer.

A wordless horizon

This research identifies and explores the thematic and technical innovations of a number of politically-engaged poets as a means to illustrate important aspects of the poet's own creative work. Fundamental to the exegesis is the development of a contemporary poetic founded on the problem of 'intersectionist oppression'

Razing Red Square

Razing Red Square is novel set in Moscow and Leningrad during the Glasnost period just prior to the fall of the Berlin wall. It analyses paradigm shifts in world politics. This novel according to the accompanying exegesis is able, albeit fictionally, to document this time faithfully and poignantly.