In 1989 cartoonist Michael Leunig began an experiment. Asked to produce a weekly carton for Sunday Age (Australia), he remembers wondering "if newspapers might carry some small spiritual message of consolation as a tiny reparation for the enormous anxiety and distress they can create..." Since then, the two collections A Common Prayer and The Prayer Tree have brought his unique humour and intriguing drawings to a wide public across the world. A Common Prayer explores the inner life, expressing it through the ancient, wonderful, do-it-yourself ritual of prayer. Michael Leunig's collection of prayers and drawings is full of gentle humour and evocative language, making the experience of his world both memorable and moving. Leunig's subjects are as ambitious as his technique is simple. World cataclysm, the Flood, loneliness, cruelty, lust and greed...sometimes whimsical, this prodigiously talented artist is never guilty of whimsy, and mercifully, he is never "relevant", "socially aware" or "narrowly political".' Barry Humphries