Since its publication in 1967, Joan Lindsay’s Picnic at Hanging Rock has exercised a peculiar fascination over Australian readers. Its tale of the unexplained and apparently inexplicable disappearance of three schoolgirls and a teacher from an expedition to the Rock is so well known that it scarcely needs further elaboration. Interest and sales were boosted by Peter Weir’s 1975 film. With its lyrical progression of girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes, which ushered in what we like to think of as the rebirth of the Australian cinema, or at least its serious appraisal by the rest of the world.