Anthology

This book of a dozen essays, with a foreword by Sir Kenneth Weare (his last substantial piece of writing before he died), concentrates on various aspects of the changing Anglo-Australian relationship.

It is an enlightening collection, for most of the essays test and in some cases challenge the ‘conventional wisdom’ which pervades recent analyses of Australian life. This is especially useful to this reviewer who, as an immigrant of two years’ standing, discovered on arrival a veritable industry of writers in various disciplines all concerned with the search for an Australian identity. Two essays, for a start, provide the leaven in reassessment of George Johnston’s literary quest for ‘the way home’, as well as Donald Horne’s ‘Lucky Country’ theme and Alan Renouf’s ‘Frightened Country’ analysis. The first is interestingly dealt with by Alan Lawson in his ‘Acknowledging Colonialism: Revisions of the Australian Tradition’, which challenges several half-truths which have become maxims. Horne and Renouf immediately spring to mind in J.D.B. Miller’s ‘An Empire That Don’t Care What You Do’. This essay is a ‘must’ for those people who view most past (and some present) Australian leaders as supine in their dealings with British counterparts.

How, not being an anthropologist, do you set about reviewing tales and fragments of experience from Aboriginals of the Kimberleys? You might begin by stating your difficulties.

People like me can usually establish some kind of empathetic link with the arts and traditions of many cultures. If we cannot feel our way into them, at least we can derive intellectual pleasure from contemplating them: as a rule there is some point of contact, although to us, of the western heritage, nothing can ever be as real as what belongs to the family of Hellenism. I can ‘make something’ of Hindu sculpture, Inca masks, Negro jazz; perhaps even of shamanic spells.

Anyone interested in quickly assessing the scope, direction and lacunae of urban history in Australia would be well advised to read this attractively priced and presented anthology. Although only two of the ten contributions have been specially commissioned, the rest are recent pieces, mostly from out-of-print, expensive or turgid larger works. These are two general essays, an article on each of the capitals (with the exception of Perth), and three specialised pieces on aspects of city growth (sub-division of Paddington 1875-90, essential services and Melbourne in the 1880s, and East Perth 1884-1904).

I think it was Judith Wright who once remarked that Lawson as a poet wasn’t important; that he seems, usually to have turned to verse as a journalistic medium or as a weapon for propaganda, and that the few of his better poems were such rather because of the intensity of feeling than through any technical or poetic gift.

Science-fiction short stories traditionally made their first appearance in American and British pulp magazines. The best stories then appeared in anthologies. In recent years more stories have been published for the first time in all-new anthologies, skipping the preliminary magazine stage. This in turn has led to the growth of science fiction publication in those countries, such as Australia, which do not have sufficient population to support specialist science fiction magazines of their own. Other Worlds and Rooms of Paradise are each all-new anthologies of science fiction. Rooms of Paradise is the more polished collection. Six of its twelve stories are by established overseas writers – including stars like Brian Aldiss and R.A. Lafferty – and the other six are by Australians. The local product is not overshadowed in this company; I think that in general the Australian stories are as well written and more original.