/lit/ - Literature

Now I know what your thinking: "You don't have literature down there! Ausfags just spend their time drinking and banning video games when they're not having terrible pings!"

Well, you'd be a bit of a duffer if you thought that.

(Although if you're Australian and your response is negative it's usually something to do with cultural cringe or being landed with some school of resentment lit/Tim Winton in Year 12 English or you're just cunt...but I digress.)

This is the obligatory posting of Australian lit chart. I've found it a good resource in my attempts to fix up the rather absent amount of Australian literature in my education and reading up until the past couple of years.

It was obviously compiled by some /lit/ sorts who have seemingly disappeared off the planet, possibly crushed under the foot of the Yank hordes of /lit/ wielding the bibliography of David Foster Wallace (or they may have had better things to do with their time than I) but nevertheless, their recommendations have stood me in good stead.

Actually, if anyone has the old one with that picture of Chopper not overlapped, it'd be much appreciated.

>>2353153

And the Ass Saw the Angel should be on that.

>>2353187

I really need to read that. Though I'll admit the only thing I like in regards to Nick Cave at the moment is his screenwriting contributions. Never was a huge fan of "the Bad Seeds" or "The Birthday Party" - despite the latter naming itself after the great Harold Pinter play. I fear I'm in the minority there sometimes.

>>2353222
Along with his film scoring

This is Patrick White - arguably one of Australia's greatest novelists and is our nation's only Nobel Prize for Literature laureate, and probably will be for some time unless Les Murray keeps his mouth shut bagging out the Arts establishment that butters his bread and doesn't die of the inevitable massive coronary before the Academy gets to him...but I digress.

White is really quite a difficult writer which would partially explain his collapse somewhat in the Australian consciousness (although in the first place, his career only took off when the Americans got excited about him), as his "painterly" modernist prose can be a challenge to get a grasp of at times. The celebrated Australian critic and poet A.D. Hope once described his writing as "pretentious and illiterate sludge" which first makes me wonder what he'd say about Tim Winton and then makes me realise that I actually agree with him on the sludge, though I find it an absolute pleasure to trudge I think Hope ended up warming up to White in the end.

Probably the best starting point is Voss, which is a fictionalised version of the disastrous expedition of Leichardt but ultimately is a tale of a man's attempt at divinity and an interesting metaphysical love story (if you can even call it that).

I've also read The Tree of Man which in some ways riffs on the idea of a Great Australian novel with an epic family saga but like the other epic that comes to mind (Henry Handel Richardson's - The Fortunes of Richard Mahony) it's really an in-depth character study and is utterly beautifully written to boot.

There's some good Australian poetry. The Augustans (notably A.D. Hope), Ern Malley + creators, the Sydney school of poets.
That's it. No Australian novels of any worth. Very little literature of any worth.
As soon as I have the means, I'm getting naturalised somewhere in Europe and then I'll go to the nearest Australian embassy, spit in their faces, and renounce my citizenship.

>>2353233
>Great Australian novel
>implying such a thing exists
>implying the "Arts" establishment isn't a sorry damn excuse

>>2353222

I love the Bad Seeds, Birthday Party and Grinderman. Between them there's something for everyone, well maybe.

>>2353233

Had to read The Aunt's Story for first year uni, fucking hated it. But maybe I didn't give it a fair go, will try him again.

>>2353235

Dorothy Porter was especially good. Akhenaten was fucked up.

>>2353233

The Vivisector is the shit.

>>2353281

Vivisection is unethical.

Voss has been on my reading list forever but I never find it anywhere. Is that his best novel, or should I try looking for another one?

Well I'm back from a trip to IGA culminating in witnessing a teenager with an Aussie flag as a cape being told he "looked like a tosser" by his mother. Made my day somewhat.

Hate having to refrain from doing the smart-arse thing of asking whether they know who Edmund Barton is when I see such characters though.

>>2353235

Ah yes, the Ern Malley affair. As someone once put it on here: "Australia's greatest modernist poet just happens to be a fraud". Nicely put, I think.

Love A.D. Hope. His poem Australia is particularly appropriate given today. I actually have an autographed copy of a selected poems volume of his which I'm pretty chuffed about.

Though "very little literature" of any worth...

>>2353253

Flawed Arts funding and annoying dilletantes is better than having absolutely nothing.

>>2353262

I think that's the novel A.D. Hope's criticisms were mainly heaped on if I recall.

>>2353296

I don't know if it's his best novel, as I haven't read all his work yet (I'm taking it rather slow). But it is widely regarded in the same sense as The Vivisector and Tree of Man.

>>2353287

Dohoho.

>>2353296
Most second hand places have large amounts of White. All libraries I've seen have copies, albeit incredibly weather beaten ones from 1856.

>>2353474

Really? Whereabouts.

My locals are hopeless when it comes to him or Australian content in general that isn't the umpteenth selection of Banjo Paterson's poetry (why get that when you can buy everything in a one volume paperback from Wordsworth Editions off Book Depository).

I mean, bush romanticism from a noted city slicker is nice and all, but sometimes one wants to branch out. Maybe get a Henry Lawson short story collection or something, you know.

>>2353500

Newtown

>>2353528

Newtown? What happened to the old one?

>>2353538
Get the FUCK OUT.

Frank moorehouse is a must, especially the Americans, baby. Funny, blunt and insightful about shifting alegences from commonwealth the America.

Frank hardy, and although I want to strangle mareke, he was alright.

As my patriotic move I started Oscar and Lucinda today.

>poetry
Peter porter
Kenneth slessor

Although it is music...
Slim dusty. I really admire and enjoy his continuing of the ballodic nature of early Australian poetry.

>>2353554

You can use this for next time.

>>2353569

puck you miss

>>2353568

I've been meaning to read O&L, but it looks surprisingly daunting. Maybe not Xavier Herbert's "Poor Fellow My Country" daunting but yeah.

At the moment all I've read of Carey's is "True History of the Kelly Gang" and "...Tristan Smith", the former was a nice little historical novel though, as I've said many times, the central conceit of it being written by Ned doesn't always work. Tristan Smith was really disappointing despite a fascinating setting and an interesting though less comedic usage of Flann O'Brien style footnotes. I'm hoping when I read his more major works (Oscar&Lucinda, Illywhacker) that he doesn't turn out to have a Tim Winton-esque inflated reputation.

And when I fix up my Uni library fines, I'm going to get stuck into Moorehouse (the local isn't that great with him, even with intra-library stuff).

I also loved Frank Hardy's "But The Dead Are Many" even if it felt a bit stifling at times. Power Without Glory could've also used a bit of editing to be honest.

Also I accidentally saw Marieke in porn... I'd prefer it if it was somebody like Leigh Sales to be honest.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4AchHTN-XQ

fuckin celebrate ya poof

>>2353654

>salutes flag

>>2353500
Yeah honestly every bookstore in Newtown has 10 copies of everything by White, Malouf and Carey. Go get their whole oeuvre for $20