AustLit

'She charges space, she rakes and ruffles her cropped and bleached hair, her dark eyes narrow as her thought uncoils with the lasso of smoke from her cigarette, and she moves, lean and feline-slinky in her riot of colours, her pendant earrings swinging, her deep voice booming, laughter welling from the depths. We can’t take our eyes off her, this brilliant magnetic being, as she teaches and entertains – and with Lesley one always implies the other. We’re at Murdoch University, back in 1987-8, then a relatively radical institution, fostering cross-fertilisations amongst the disciplines, and Lesley, a film theorist and critic of growing renown, is also on fire creatively.'(Introduction)