AustLit
Latest Issues
Contents
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‘Something That Makes Us Ponder’ : A Virtual Book Club in Central Queensland, 1928–38,
single work
criticism
(p. 15-29)'When considering the question of reading provision in remote regions, Australian historians have tended to focus on the challenge of distributing books and other reading matter affordably across vast and sparsely populated areas. In the back-blocks of Western Queensland between the wars, however, the problem of distribution had been addressed with some success: by mail orders to metropolitan book retailers, subsidised postal rates, local Schools of Arts libraries, the Workers’ Educational Association and, above all, the efficient operations of the Queensland Bush Book Club, which performed extraordinary feats of remote distribution throughout the interwar period. Isolated booklovers could almost take for granted a steady — if somewhat limited and belated — supply of books to read. Two things they could not take for granted, however, were reliable, disinterested and informed advice about what books to choose (where choice was available) and — even more important — the opportunity to share their reading experiences with others. Walter Murdoch once said, ‘It is a basic fact that when you have read a book you want to talk about it.’ That may overstate the case a little, but there is no doubt that the desire to communicate the pleasures, occasional disappointments and sense of discovery in reading books — no matter how solitary the reading experience itself may have been — was and is very strong and widespread, and that single families or households did not then (and do not now) necessarily provide congenial environments for such ‘book talk’.' (Publication abstract)
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Nostalgia and Belonging : Henry George Lamond Writing the Whitsunday Islands,
single work
criticism
(p. 49-61)
'Henry George Lamond is no longer a household name, but he was once popular and widely known in Australia and overseas. An extremely prolific writer, he published fifteen books of fiction and non-fiction, and more than 900 essays and magazine articles in his lifetime. His essays and articles include writing in a wide range of subjects and genres, from romantic fiction to practical agricultural advice. He was perhaps best known for his animal-based books, including Horns and Hooves (1931), An Aviary on the Plains (1934a), Dingo (1945), Brindle Royalist (1946) and Big Red (1953a). These titles were popular in the United States, England and Australia. Some were translated into other languages, including German and French, and they even formed part of school curricula. His tales are set in the Australian landscape and are ‘littered with bush colloquialisms’ (Bonnin 2000).' (Publication abstract)
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The Business of Myth-making : Mary Poppins, P.L. Travers and the Disney Effect,
single work
criticism
(p. 62-74)'In just one of the many extraordinary moments during the spectacular Opening Ceremony of the 2012 London Olympic Games, thirty Mary Poppinses floated into the stadium on their umbrellas to battle a 40 foot-long inflatable Lord Voldemort. This multi-million pound extravaganza was telecast to a global audience of over one billion people, highlighting in an extremely effective manner the grandeur and eccentricities of the host nation, and featuring uniquely British icons such as Mr Bean, James Bond, The Beatles and Harry Potter, as well as those quintessential icons of Englishness, the Royal Family, double-decker red buses and the National Health Service.' (Publication abstract)
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‘Ropes of Stories’ : Jean Rhys, Vivienne Cleven and Melissa Lucashenko,
single work
criticism
(p. 75-84)
'Cultural narratives also function as lifelines in the work of another Queensland Indigenous woman writer, Vivienne Cleven. Cleven's novel, Bitin’ Back (2001), begins when Mavis Dooley's son, Nevil, announces that he is no longer Nevil, but the writer Jean Rhys. Although Nevil eventually reveals that he has simply been acting as a woman in order to understand the protagonist of the novel he is writing, his choice of Rhys in particular is significant. Nevil selected Jean Rhys as a signifier of his female role because, he explains:
She's my favourite author; she wrote Wide Sargasso Sea [1966]. She was ahead of her time; she wrote about society's underdogs; about rejection and the madness of isolation. I know it sounds all crazy to you, Ma, but this is about who I am . . . [A] lot of people would never understand me and they wouldn't want to. (2001: 184)' (Publication abstract)
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Malouf's Invisible City : The Intertwining of Place and Identity in David Malouf's Johnno,
single work
criticism
(p. 85-95)
'By the time poet David Malouf wrote Johnno (1976), his first work of prose fiction, he was in his late thirties and living in the Renaissance city of Florence. Both European Florence and antipodean Brisbane mirror and enfold the novel's eponymous hero, Johnno, and his narrator-creator, Dante. The Florentine poet, and by extension his medieval trappings, resonate throughout a tale about growing up in a frontier town far removed from the cosmopolitan centres of the Northern Hemisphere. This Italian connection can be explored further by considering Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities (1997) alongside Johnno. The depiction of Venice in Calvino's novel can operate as a point of contrast and comparison to the river city of Brisbane, conjured by Malouf's Dante. (Publication abstract)
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Years of Agony and Joy : The Sadie and Xavier Herbert Collection,
single work
criticism
(p. 96-98)'The University of Queensland's Fryer Library is home to many fine literary vintages. Established in 1927 as the J.D. Fryer Memorial Library of Australian Literature in honour of a former Arts student and soldier in the Australian Imperial Force (AIF), John Denis Fryer, the collection includes the papers of significant Australian journalists, novelists and poets, including Ernestine Hill, John Forbes, David Malouf, Bruce Dawe, Thomas Shapcott, Peter Carey and Oodgeroo Noonuccal among others.' (Publication abstract)
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Review : Atomic City,
single work
review
— Review of Atomic City 2013 single work novel ; (p. 99) -
Review : Gap,
single work
review
— Review of Gap 2013 single work novel ; (p. 100) -
[Review] Heat and Light,
single work
— Review of Heat and Light 2014 selected work short story ; (p. 102) -
Review : A Doll's House,
single work
review
— Review of A Doll's House 2014 single work drama ; (p. 104)
