CAN WE GRIEVE not for a person but for an institution? Should we be angry over possibilities destroyed, young talents denied a chance to flourish? Is there any point in lamenting greed, short-sightedness, the brutality of power?

As I write this, in September 2021, Australian higher education is in a deeper hole than it has been since the 1950s, when the creaky collection of universities inherited from colonial times, under severe stress, was rescued by the Menzies government. I worked in that rebuilt sector as student, teacher and researcher for about fifty years. Then I retired and wrote a book called, with a mixture of irony and hope, The Good University.