The former Labor attorney general and foreign affairs minister, Gareth Evans, has sent a scathing email to the chief executive of Melbourne University Publishing, lambasting its decision to scrap the literary journal Meanjin as “bone-headed”.

Several hundred protesters gathered outside MUP’s Swanston Street headquarters in Melbourne on Thursday protesting against the imminent closure of one of the cornerstones of Australian literary culture for 85 years.

The MUP’s chair, Warren Bebbington, has said the magazine ceased to be financially viable. It is a reason critics of the decision – including the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance and more than 2,300 writers, academics and community leaders who have signed an open letter of protest to MUP’s owner, the University of Melbourne – have received with scepticism.

Noting the magazine’s modest staffing and secured funding, the closure has ignited speculation that possible political motives tied to its coverage of Gaza lie behind the journal’s demise.

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The fact that its editor, Esther Anatolitis, and deputy editor, Eli McLean, have reportedly signed non-disclosure agreements is fuelling the speculation.

“Shameful news,” Evans wrote in an email sent to MUP’s chief executive and publisher Foong Ling Kong, which has been seen by the Guardian.

“A totally bone-headed and indefensible decision by your board. I thought it was only the ANU … that was capable of destroying iconic national institutions, chanting the mantra of financial self-sufficiency … I only hope some philanthropist with deep pockets, and a sense of decency and national pride, steps up to keep the journal going.”

Thursday’s protesters, led by the writer and Monash University academic Ben Eltham, have also called for MUP to transfer ownership of Meanjin rather than dissolve it. But according to sources the Guardian spoke to, MUP holds all intellectual property rights, including the journal’s name, preventing any revival by another entity.

“The journal is not for sale”, Kong said in a statement to the Guardian on Thursday, confirming that while the copyright for individual pieces of work resides with the contributors, MUP owns the copyright of any published collection or compilation drawn from the Meanjin archive.

Coincidentally, a piece by Evans – these days an honorary professor at ANU – will appear in the final edition of Meanjin, scheduled for publication in early December.

His essay on the three works of Australian literature that most influenced his formative years – Alan Marshall’s I Can Jump Puddles, Nevil Shute’s On The Beach and Donald Horne’s The Lucky Country – will come almost 50 years after the then law academic, who had yet to enter politics, first published in Meanjin, on the topic of Labor and the constitution.