Following our AGM at 5pm, we are delighted that Dr Andrew Lemon will present this year's Weston Bate oration, AUSTRALIAN HISTORY AS LITERATURE: AUSTRALIAN LITERATURE AS HISTORY. Andrew contemplates the nature of the divide between the writing of history and the writing of fiction. Our best historians—including the late Weston Bate—are invariably outstanding writers, but why is it that historians are so rarely included when the literary world acclaims the best Australian writers? This lecture looks at the writing of Australian history as literature, and considers why journalists and storytellers customarily outsell academic historians when writing on historical subjects. Does this matter? Should aspiring historians be taught about good writing and literary technique? Has jargon and cliché prevailed in the academic teaching and writing of history?