After a string of books that didn’t excite me or make me want to press them into the hands of friends—an unfortunate trend for someone whose livelihood depends on being enthusiastic about books—I was delighted to start Their Brilliant Careers by Ryan O’Neill a few weeks ago. Meanjin subscribers will recognise some of the stories from their first publication in past issues. This is a collection of short stories starring fictional figures in Australian literature—from an alcoholic editor who overzealously intervenes in his wife’s work to a communist organiser who disparages all writing that doesn’t fall under the category ‘socialist realism’. Readers will find both real authors—Geordie Williamson, Peter Carey, Charlotte Wood—and veiled stand-ins—the reviewer Peter Crawley and the literary journals Northerly, Overground and Quarter.

For this reader, the book was a perfect remedy, cleansing me of some accumulated weariness. Contemporary Australian literature is, for the most part, not interested in humour. On prize lists, in review pages and in independent bookseller windows, you will rarely find literary books that are funny. It’s almost as if such writing is seen as too fluffy or lacking seriousness. A potential hangover of cultural cringe, perhaps. As if, in order for our work to be taken seriously, it must, in fact, be serious. But to my mind humour can be one of the best means to really critique and engage with the biggest concerns of the time. O’Neill’s satire of these imagined authors’ treatment of Indigenous Australians, women and narrow delineations of masculinity deftly probe some of the underlying prejudices and shortcomings of contemporary Australian letters—and by extension, life. But these interrogations, accompanied as they are by the occasional chortle or smirk, access our thinking in a different way. One of the pleasures and accompanying possibilities of such fiction is the ability to engage and persuade subtly, side-on and without didacticism.