'Editorial' by Helen Daniel

Cosy was the word Cassandra Pybus preferred when asked if Australian reviewing is too bland – the topic of this month’s symposium. Something intimate and specially friendly. In identifying the cosiness of some Australian reviewing, Pybus makes a telling point, if droll, certainly not excluding ABR from the offenders. I have to say that among the other responses were some that were bland, in a way that made me feel I have proved my point. But there were also some responses that were forthright and telling, and the whole symposium makes for very interesting reading. Mark Davis, author of Gangland, identifies ‘cronyism, puffery, barrow-pushing and a forelock-tugging reverence for overseas publications of limited interest’, adding that ‘the literati seem to be on a mission to bore us all to death.’ Gerard Windsor, writer and critic, admits to ‘a prejudice ... for erring on the side of the review as its own art form, as independent entertainment’ – which I whole-heartedly endorse. Kerryn Goldsworthy, writer and critic, sees blandness in ‘a welter of commonplace opinion and a palpable absence of ideas or theories or even just ordinary facts’. Ivor Indyk, critic and editor of HEAT, points out that he can think of ‘at least a dozen critics whose opinions are lively, honest and true’ but adds that such reviewers don’t very often get the opportunity to review. Something dreadfully amiss with the system in that case. So where did the topic for the symposium come from? It arose partly because I feel in general that Australian reviewing is too bland – lacking in animation and energy, confined to the banal, lacking in forthrightness, and very often adopting a stance of fence sitting. Tepid, confined to the surface, and very often, in the case of fiction, confined to retelling the plot. At their worst, bland reviews are boring to read, which I think is a radical failure in a review – an art form in its own right at its best. The topic also came to mind more specifically because of some reviews I have read recently of Adib Khan’s recent novel, The Storyteller, which I launched with great enthusiasm at the Melbourne Writers’ Festival. I think it is a splendid novel, narrated in a gripping and resonant style, with a fascinating figure at its core, as well as portraying the dark underside of modern Delhi with great colour and vivacity. Though I have since read another enthusiastic review, before it came two tepid reviews, both couched in blandness in my view. Clearly this is partly a matter of personal taste and literary preference – obviously the two bland reviewers did not enjoy the novel as much as I did. But the point about all three reviews that I found amazing was the failure to place the Khan novel in any kind of context – specifically, in the case of The Storyteller in the context of Peter Carey’s Tristan Smith. Both novels are about a grotesque misshapen dwarf and although Carey and Khan explore their figures in dramatically different ways – Carey in the context of American/Australian cultural relations and Khan in the context of storytelling and the power of the imagination – despite these differences the two novels share the figure of the dwarf. I find it well-nigh unbelievable that a new dwarf could enter our literature as dramatically as Khan’s Vamana does without there being any reference to Carey’s antecedent figure. I suppose it comes back to my belief that a good review will always try to offer a sense of context into which the new work can be received. Clearly the reviewers of the bland Storyteller reviews do not share my belief. The symposium is a leading feature of this issue, as is Raimond Gaita’s remarkable essay on reconciliation. Entitled ‘Who speaks, about what, to whom, on whose behalf, with what right?’, the essay examines a range of philosophical and ontological perspectives on the topic of reconciliation as well as exploring such related concepts as shame and forgiveness. Gaita writes with the belief that ‘Aborigines are still only partially visible to the moral faculties of many (most?) Australians, even to many who are committed to reconciliation’. It is an important and timely essay. Short story entries are pouring in for the competition. Just a reminder that the competition closes on October 23 and the winners will be announced at a forum on short story writing, to be held in Melbourne at the Reader’s Feast Bookshop, on November 30, as well as published in the early editions of ABR in 2001.

Helen Daniel

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