30 Years of Hating Alison Ashley

Robin Klein was one of my favourite authors when I was a youngin’ and Hating Alison Ashley might just be my favourite of all her books. It’s a wonderful novel – a comedy really – featuring one of the great comic creations in Erica Yurken and her (mostly one-sided, but hugely entertaining) rivalry with Alison Ashley.

Hating Alison Ashley

This year is the 30th anniversary of the book’s publication and in celebration I’ve written an article reflecting on Hating Alison Ashley and its place in Australian literature over on the Wheeler Centre’s website.

Here’s a highlight:

Reading it should be an occasion, a rite-of-passage, in every Australian child’s life. So bring out your old copies and share them with your kids. Buy the pretty new Australian Children’s Classic edition and make a birthday present of it. And reread it yourself. Because a country full of people who have read Hating Alison Ashley would be a lucky country indeed.

You can read the full article here.

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