Richard Fidler and M. Gessen
10 March
Conversations with Richard Fidler and M. Gessen
6:00pm, Tuesday 10th March 2026
Powerhouse Theatre, Brisbane Powerhouse
In 2020 (an eventful year), award-winning journalist and New Yorker contributor M. Gessen released Surviving Autocracy, an astute and pragmatic guide to navigating the erosion of political norms and freedoms. Drawing on their Soviet childhood and years spent working as a journalist in Putin’s Russia, Gessen offers a deep and incisive analysis of how language, media and other social fixtures are co-opted and dismantled by autocratic leaders like Trump – and why institutions won’t save the day. Five years on, as the collapse of the liberal international order (not to mention the East Wing of the White House) accelerates, Gessen’s work is essential to surviving what might come next.
Join this leading thinker and commentator on our global authoritarian turn as they discuss what Trump 2.0 means for the future of democracy.
Check out more of our 2026 out-of-season event line-up below!
#BWF 2025 Highlights
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Artwork credits:
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2024 hero image by Samuel Tupou
2023 hero image by Brent Wilson
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Brisbane Writers Festival is held on the lands of the Yuggera and Turrbul people, on the banks of the Maiwar river. We recognise the important and ongoing contributions of Indigenous Australians to art and literature, and pay our respects to elders past, present and emerging.