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Issue Details: First known date: 2021... no. 434 August 2021 of Australian Book Review est. 1961 Australian Book Review
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'The August issue offers readers a feast of fiction, along with the magazine’s usual probing commentary and criticism. The issue features all three stories shortlisted for the Elizabeth Jolley Short Story Prize, as well as reviews of new books by Rachel Cusk, Tony Birch, Bill Birtles and ABR Rising Star Sarah Walker. In non-fiction, Stephen Bennetts highlights one of the overlooked contexts for the debate over Bruce Pascoe’s Dark Emu, while Michael Dwyer recounts Australian journalists’ enduring fascination with China. The risks of border crossing are also weighed by Elisabeth Holdsworth and Seumas Spark in their reviews of recent books on the history of transportation. Brenda Walker and Jim Davidson pay tributes to the achievements of Hazel Rowley and Robin Boyd, respectively, and there are poems by Joan Fleming, John Kinsella, and Laurie Duggan – as well as plenty more!'(Publication summary)

Notes

  • Includes : There Are No Stars Here, Either by Lauren Sarazen (shortlisted for the 2021 Elizabeth Jolley Short Story Prize)

Contents

* Contents derived from the 2021 version. Please note that other versions/publications may contain different contents. See the Publication Details.
‘Alien of Exceptional Ability’ Recalling Hazel Rowley Ten Years After Her Death, Brenda Walker , single work review
— Review of Life as Art : The Biographical Writing of Hazel Rowley Hazel Rowley , 2021 selected work biography ;

'The biographer Hazel Rowley enjoyed the fact that her green card – permitting her to work in America – classified her as an ‘Alien of exceptional ability’. This is close to perfect: her own biography in a few words. If not exactly an alien, she was usefully and often shrewdly awry in a variety of situations: in the academic world of the 1990s, in tense Parisian literary circles, and in the fraught environment of American race relations. It helped that she was Australian, and a relative outsider. The people she sought information from were less likely to categorise her and more inclined to talk. Her books – the major biographies of Christina Stead (1993) and Richard Wright (2001), Tête-à-tête: Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre (2005), and Franklin and Eleanor: An extraordinary marriage (2010) – are certainly evidence of exceptional ability, as well as obsession and tenacity.' (Introduction)

(p. 15)
Closer : Chaos and Coming of Age, Kate Crowcroft , single work review
— Review of The First Time I Thought I Was Dying Sarah Walker , 2021 selected work essay ;

'In The First Time I Thought I Was Dying, the photographer–artist Sarah Walker brings into focus ideas about anxiety, control, bodily functions, and the uses of breached boundaries. The essays of this book are personal, and readers of confessional non-fiction will delight in their tone: equal parts jocose and sincere.' (Introduction) 

(p. 20)
Every Taxi Driver in This City Asks ‘Do You Have Children?’i"Yes", Joan Fleming , single work poetry (p. 28)
The Other Side of the Story : The Smuggler as Humanitarian, Elisabeth Holdsworth , single work review
— Review of Smuggled 2021 anthology poetry essay autobiography ;

'Professors Ruth Balint and Julie Kalman are descended from Jews impacted by the Holocaust. No surprise then that in the introductory sentences of this work they remind us that the first people smuggler was probably Moses. Throughout the Jewish year, we study this colossus, who may or may not have existed, as he leads the Hebrews out of Pharaoh’s bondage into the desert toward a promised land. For much of the past two thousand years, Jews have relied on people smugglers as they were shunted from country to country. In Smuggled: An illegal history of journeys to Australia, Balint and Kalman detach the people smuggler from the politicised, malign tropes surrounding this activity and present firsthand accounts from some of those who were smuggled and from the smugglers themselves.' (Introduction)

(p. 29)
The Enemy, Asyndeton, Camilla Chaudhary , single work short story (p. 32-37)
Carrying Our Stories : Tony Birch’s New Short Fiction, Anthony Lynch , single work review
— Review of Dark As Last Night Tony Birch , 2021 selected work short story ;

'‘And what is wrong with sad stories? The world is always sad.’ So advises Little Red, the aged, marginalised, knowing female character in the title story of Tony Birch’s latest short fiction collection. As in Birch’s previous works, Dark as Last Night contains an abundance of sad stories, but with grief and trauma ameliorated by the main protagonist’s affection for at least one other character, be it a family member or neighbour.' (Introduction)

(p. 40)
Monsters : A Hitchcockian Crime Début, Jay Daniel Thompson , single work review
— Review of The Tribute John Byron , 2021 single work novel ;

'The Tribute begins with a corpse. And not just any corpse. This body is discovered in a Sydney terrace house with its organs removed. One detective describes the crime as ‘butchery’, and that’s an understatement. This murder is the work of Stephen Porter, a deceptively bland chap who uses his bank job to secure the schedules and addresses of victims. These victims are then dissected as ‘tributes’ to the Fabrica, a collection of sixteenth-century anatomy books.'  (Introduction)

(p. 41)
Bani’s Story : Michael Mohammed Ahmad’s New Novel, Shannon Burns , single work review
— Review of The Other Half of You Michael Mohammed Ahmad , 2021 single work novel ;

'Bani Adam returns as the narrator–protagonist of Michael Mohammed Ahmad’s The Other Half of You, a sequel to his two previous books. The most recent one, The Lebs (2018), gave us the story of Bani’s teenage years at Punchbowl Boys’ High School: the trials of a Lebanese Muslim boy in a majority Lebanese Muslim community nestled inside the larger, diverse territories of Western Sydney, in post-‘War on Terror’ Australia. The Other Half of You is an account of Bani’s late teens and early twenties, and of an inner conflict between religious, cultural, and romantic pieties.' (Introduction)

(p. 42)
Pastiche Eclogue with Randolph Stow’s ‘Ishmael’i"When Ishmael escaped from the closed Bible", John Kinsella , single work poetry (p. 44)
A Fall from Grace, John Richards , single work short story (p. 45-48)
Poet of the Month : An Interview with John Kinsella, single work interview (p. 50)
Elevator Pitches : Three Experimental Novels, Alex Cothren , single work review
— Review of Night Blue Angela O'Keeffe , 2021 single work novel ; Where the Line Breaks Michael Burrows , 2021 single work novel ; The Speechwriter Martin McKenzie-Murray , 2021 single work novel ;

'Writers seeking publication are often advised to have an ‘elevator pitch’ ready. These succinct book-hooks are designed to jag a trapped publisher in the wink between a lift door closing and reopening. Has this insane tactic ever actually worked? No idea. But it’s fun to imagine the CEO of Big Sales Books, on their way up to another corner-office day of tallying cricket memoir profits, blindsided by three of the looniest elevator pitches imaginable. A novel narrated by Jackson Pollock’s Blue Poles! A faux political memoir about a prime minister and his shark vendetta! An academic satire cum historical mystery mashup told largely through the – wait, wait, wait! – footnotes of a PhD thesis! That CEO will probably take the stairs next time, but kudos to the independent publishers who saw the potential in these experimental works and their début authors. Whatever the path of weird Australian writing, long may it find its way to these pages.' (Introduction)

(p. 55-56)
Unpredictive Chemistry : The Bloodbeat of Evocative Language, Rose Lucas , single work review
— Review of Trigger Warning Maria Takolander , 2021 selected work poetry ; Rare Bird James Lucas , 2021 selected work poetry ; The Hard Word Peter Kirkpatrick , 2021 selected work poetry ;
(p. 56-57)
Wordsi"a poem is a house into which", Laurie Duggan , single work poetry (p. 59)
Open Page : An Interview with Laura Elizabeth Woollett, single work interview (p. 60)
Shared Interests : Russell and Mabel Grimwade’s Legacy, John Arnold , single work review
— Review of Pride of Place : Exploring the Grimwade Collection 2020 multi chapter work criticism art work ;

'Pride of Place describes in detail a selection of the outstanding collection of Australian books, paintings, photographs, and prints that Russell and Mabel Grimwade donated to the University of Melbourne. The main focus is on Russell, but they were clearly a team with shared interests in Australian native trees and plants and the European history of Australia.' (Introduction)

(p. 62)
Such Pretty Teeth, Dear : The Tension between Thrills and Conservation, Anne Rutherford , single work review
— Review of Playing With Sharks : The Valerie Taylor Story 2021 single work film/TV ;

'Any film about shark conservation faces a dilemma: how to de-sensationalise an animal whose cinematic charisma relies on the combination of thrill and fear. What reels us in as viewers is the excitement of an up-close, full-frontal encounter with a dangerous predator. Film scholar Tom Gunning talks about this as ‘lust for the eyes’, when an image ‘rushes forward to meet the viewer’, provoking ‘a complicated sort of excitement bordering on terror’.' (Introduction)

(p. 65-66)

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

Last amended 13 Aug 2021 07:00:06
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