It is human rights lawyer Jennifer Robinson's birthday, and she is up at 7am, coffee in hand, talking The Weekly through the minutia of the WikiLeaks High Court appeal from her London home. She has just flown in from Geneva, having recently returned to Europe from Australia, via Saudi Arabia, and is readying herself for the final fight in her 13-year campaign for her high-profile client, Julian Assange. Despite the early hour, she is warm and conversational. There is no sign of jetlag or her hectic schedule as she shares anecdotes of her childhood in Berry, on the NSW south coast, of dinner parties with Salman Rushdie and Dannii Minogue, and the implications of the ruling that lies ahead. She discusses her devotion to ending the way domestic violence victims are silenced, her fierce support for the public education system and, of all things, the imposter syndrome that plagued her during her years as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University.
For a barrister who has represented some of the world's largest media organisations and was named International Pro Bono Barrister of the Year in 2019, one would have imagined the venerable halls of Oxford were a haven. Not so, says Jen.
"You're surrounded by the best students from the best universities around the world and there's this very male culture where you're not shown any examples of women who have succeeded.
I remember finding it really challenging, incredibly competitive, pressurised, and incredibly sexist.
It was just difficult," she explains. "My imposter syndrome was going wild."
Oxford is a long way from her small hometown. And Balliol College's spires and stone garrets pre-date the colonisation of Australia. The college has produced four British Prime Ministers and two former Australian Prime Ministers (Bob Hawke and Tony Abbott). But few 22-year-olds could boast a resumé like Jennifer's.
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