You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
The volume questions traditional nation-centred narratives of the Empire as an exclusively British undertaking by concentrating on the transnational networks of German migrants, pursued over more than two centuries in a multitude of geographical settings within the British Empire.
The time for new approaches to White's work is overdue. Central to the present study are Edward Said's ideas about the role of the intellectual (and the writer) – of speaking “truth to power,” and also the importance of tracing the “affiliations” of a text and its embeddedness in the world. This approach is not incompatible with Jung's theory of the 'great' artist and his capacity to answer the deep-seated psychic needs of his people. White's work has contributed in many different ways to the writing of the nation. The spiritual needs of a young nation such as Australia must also comprehend its continual urge towards self-definition. Explored here is one important aspect of that ch...
A lucid and rewarding synthesis of cultural and western history. -- Richard W. Etulain, author of Writing Western History. Wrobel makes a fine contribution to the study of myth by analyzing the anxiety, or angst, Americans felt about the frontier in the half-century after 1890. This is an excellent book on a big subject, executed with much skill. -- Western Historical Quarterly. Direct, admirably brief, and crisply written. -- Journal of American History.
Previously overshadowed in the public imagination by notions of American cowboys and the wild west, Australian stockmen are given the place they so richly deserve in pastoral and Australian history in this insightful study. From the lonely months on a long cattle drive to the boots they wore and the places they lived in, the stockmen and their unique way of life is intelligently explored in this comprehensive work.
Patrick White (1912–1990) won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1973 and remains one of Australia’s most celebrated writers. In 2006, White’s literary executor, Barbara Mobbs, released a highly significant collection of hitherto unpublished papers, reviving mainstream and scholarly interest in his work. 'Patrick White Beyond the Grave' considers White’s writing in light of the new findings, acknowledging his homosexuality in relation to the development of his literary style, examining the way he engages his readers, and contextualizing his life and oeuvre in relation to London and to London life. Thought-provoking, this collection of original essays represents the work of an outstanding list of White scholars from around the globe, and will no doubt inspire further work on White from a rising generation of scholars of twentieth-century literature beyond Australia.
In this detailed study of literary culture in the inter-war period, Jason Harding examines the standing of T. S. Eliot's journal the Criterion in relation to other literary periodicals and, beyond that, to the larger cultural networks of the time. Through his examination of insufficiently known archive material and interviews with living witnesses to the period, Harding significantly alters our understanding of the journal and of Eliot's role as editor.
A rich and riveting record of both literary and social value. Frank Sargeson is one of New Zealand's best-loved and most important writers. Besides the ground-breaking short stories, he wrote memoirs, novels, and plays. He encouraged at least three generations of younger writers and, for most of his adult life, the famous bach behind the hedge at 14 Esmonde Road was at the heart of New Zealand's artistic and literary world. Sargeson was also a prolific letter writer, and this selection of 500 of the most fascinating ranges over half a century, from 1927 to 1981. The letters are immensely readable, vividly capturing his life and times, his milieu and his personality. Frank loved gossip, could be bitchy and peevish, but also kind, affectionate, funny, ribald, astute. This collection, selected, edited and annotated by Sarah Shieff, is a document of extraordinary significance for all those interested in New Zealand's literary and social history.
Blooms and Brushstrokes takes you on a unique journey through the history of Australian art, one flower at a time, examining the blooms depicted in still lifes, floral portraits, decorative interiors and botanical illustrations by a long line of Australian artists. Mother-and-daughter team Penelope and Tansy Curtin start this fascinating journey in the late eighteenth century, when the traditions adhering to the Western art canon were transplanted into the newly colonised Australia. They follow it through the rapidly developing artistic styles of the early twentieth century, to the new media of the contemporary period. These works of art also shine a light on the role and importance of plant...
"But this scholarly achievement was in many ways matched by the part he played in the intellectual and cultural life of New Zealand in his time. A prolific writer and critic he became committed to making New Zealand a more lively and civilised place to live, and through his work at Victoria University, his teaching, his involvement with the New Zealand Council for Civil Liberties and the New Zealand Historic Places Trust - among many such organisations - his influence was far reaching." "Drawing on J.C. Beaglehole's own writing, especially his sparkling unpublished letters, the author has woven together all the aspects of his father's life into an immensely readable narrative. The two chapters on Beaglehole's work on James Cook create a picture of the historical scholar at work, and give the book an international significance."--BOOK JACKET.
A fascinating cultural studies account of the "afterlife" of Leichhardt, revealing both German entanglement in British colonialism in Australia, and in a broader sense, what happens when we maintain an open stance to the ghosts of the past.