Fremantle Press interviewed Brendan about his chapter in the book Beyond the Dark: Dystopian Texts in the Secondary English Classroom (edited by Patricia Dowsett, Ellen Rees and Alex Wharton, and published by the Australian Association for the Teaching of English). 

Classic dystopian novels like 1984 and Tomorrow When the War Began still appear to be popular choices in the classroom. In many respects, we’re living in a dystopian world right now. People are sick, isolating, wearing masks in supermarkets. And not long before this, half of the country was on fire. It’s all pretty terrifying. Young people could probably do with more tools to make sense of the world around them. Dystopian fiction has always offered a safe place to explore our fears about the present and future.

Brendan Ritchie

Read the full interview over on the Fremantle Press website.