AustLit

Louisa Anne Meredith's Tasmanian texts for children combine prose, poetry, and drawings (both botanical and decorative) to sing the praises of Nature. Her message is one of wonderment at the beauty and diversity of nature as well as respect for the environment. These sentiments are influenced by her belief that nature has a strong spiritual connection to a 'higher power'. Kordula Dunscombe (1998) argues in her article on the works of Meredith that "It is heartening to look back on C19th colonial literature for children and see, amongst the messages of domination, exploitation and general disrespect for the environment, that other paradigms of the land were also offered to child readers." It is the intention of this Learning Trail to present a number of resources that will provide material for those with an interest in ecocriticism in children's and young adult literature to explore the extent to which these other paradigms were offered. These early texts can then be examined in the light of contemporary environmental texts available to young readers today. The Trail focuses on the work of Louisa Anne Meredith but includes a number of other CLDR texts which display a range of early attitudes to the environment.