History

Perhaps no other social attitude has changed so markedly in this century as the prevailing public reaction towards the question of the limitation of population growth and the use of birth control devices.

One of the joys of reading Jack Fingleton on cricket is that the personality of the author illuminates every page. It is not merely that Fingleton’s style is the man himself; his work transcends a Parnassian obsession with manner of expression. Just as one expects existentialism in every scene of a Sartre play and Shavian philosophy in every line of a Shaw prologue, the reader would be disappointed if he did not discover a highly individualistic and forceful view­point on cricket eloquently expounded in each chapter of a Fingleton book.

This is an account of a debate held at North Dakota State University between Erich von Daniken and Clifford Wilson, on the subject ‘Does the historical and archaeological evidence support the proposition that ancient human civilisation was influenced by astronauts from outer space?’ on Saturday 11 February 1978. Von Daniken is the author of several books advocating this proposition. These books have sold very well. Wilson has written several books attacking Von Daniken’s position. He is a senior lecturer in education at Monash University in Victoria; describes himself as an archaeologist, and as a ‘Bible-believing Christian.’

Fifteen years ago the British urban historian Asa Briggs wrote a short but stimulating essay on Melbourne in the Victorian era in his Victorian Cities. In thirty pages he not only challenged the conventional assumptions of Australian historiography of that time (specifically deploring the lack of systematic study of the Australian city) but also threw out various ideas about how to approach Australian urban history. It took some time for historians here to take up Briggs’ challenge, but with the publication of Graeme Davison’s The Rise and Fall of Marvellous Melbourne Australian urban history has come of age.

This is a most interesting, readable and, in a larger context, valuable book. It deals with written recollections collected from some 215 living veterans from the First A.I.F. (some have since died) – a list of their names is included as an Appendix – detailing how they felt about the War as it approached and when it commenced, and also what led them to enlist at the time. Each informant is allowed to speak for himself, with his own peculiar spelling, punctuation end style of writing; in effect, the outcome provides a broad picture of the social origins and nature of this cross-section of soldiers.

A virile energetic people inhabits the island of Malaita in the middle Solomons. From the time of first contact Malaitamen were prized for their ability to work, but they had to be handled cautiously, or their inherited pride and confidence would turn them to rebellion. Those who live on the sea-coasts are readily adaptable to innovation when they can see value in it, but they abandon tradition with some misgivings.

Bibliomania is a disease that has afflicted men, and occasionally women, in many walks of life. Some of the most famous cases have been extremely wealthy bachelors, like Richard Heber in England and David Scott Mitchell in Australia, whose only interest in life was collecting books and manuscripts. At the other end of the spectrum have been men who were leaders in business, the professions or politics, yet who still had the time, energy and money to amass huge collections. Sir John Ferguson in Australia, John Pierpont Morgan and Henry Huntington in America, William Gladstone in England and Sir George Grey in New Zealand fall into the latter category.