/lit/ - Literature

OH GOD WHAT HAPPENED.

I might start an Australian History/Politics reading list to balance out this digression, I think. So if anyone has any recommendations that'd be interesting.

It isn't Australia Day anymore but who gives a fuck.

>>6054076

Queensland and New South Wales. The two teams in "Origin". The other side of the "Barassi Line" - which I maintain has a political element these days because neither state's inhabitants need a nice cold can of calm the fuck down.

>>6054311

>Reading a Richard Flanagan now, Narrow Road on the backburner. Picked up two Patrick Whites at the book fair on the weekend. I've read very little Australian lit but I'm trying to change that.

That's what I try to do. It balances out my reading a bit. Which Patrick Whites did you pick up?

I want to read the rest of his books chronologically and get stuck into David Marr's biography after the fact. It's a long-term project since he can be hard-going and even he found his early stuff "dreary".

>>6054515

Wait for the revolution, mate.

Maintain the rage.

(God, I love co-opting Labor mythology.)

>>6054032

I know, Tassie-bro. I know. It just bothers me is all.

>>6054044

>A wilful rich girl caught in the path of a raging bushfire!

Skippy should have let that bourgeois bitch burn.

The Light on the Hill should've been a funeral pyre and so on and so forth.

(Weren't those Skippy things more /co/ material? Like photo comics?)

>>6054060

Everybody gets too teary over Kazuo Ishiguro novels so they needed another Asian who writes in English to prattle on about incessantly.

>>6053948

I'm from the outer suburbs/rural fringe of Melbourne actually. Former mortgage belt.

I'd rather move Australia Day to the 27th for starters. It's not even just from an Aboriginal perspective (which is pretty fucking justified). Never liked the whole anniversary of a bunch of convicts arriving, many of whom were essentially economic and political prisoners, with the second-sons (or is it third) of the middle-classes that made up the military. It's just a shitty basis.

>>6053952

I'm just playing into the whole hatred of Sydney thing.
But really it's urban planning and shit-cunts.

>>6053959

Ought to watch it but I'm sceptical.
I don't want another First Australians and all that emotive bullshit.

>>6053970

>What would you actually consider celebrating Australia?

Evangelion marathon and then Hong Kong softcore erotica on SBS.
RAGE consisting entirely of TISM, Barnesy and the Lateline theme on ABC.

But this is getting outside of the context of /lit/.

>>6053986

"Yes, we get it. You're from a Rugby League state. You're all angry and you're not sure why and you read a Murdoch paper and you're contrarian and you vote for Menzies Legacy-betraying Liberals that definitely aren't silver-spoon/small-l liberals because you're stupid and don't know any better because you're from a Rugby League state."

I actually don't know if you are but I just kind of wrote that on a whim.

>>6053796

Haven't had the chance but my experience with Booker novels is patchy at best (Giving McEwan an award for fucking Amsterdam whilst passing over all his actually decent work. Fuck off.)

Actually more interested in reading Gould's Book of Fish because:

>Convicts
>Tassie
>Kunstlerroman

>>6053891

>Sydney

Why didn't you say so from the start? Everything else you said was redundant.

Also most of us are not the descendents of criminals, convict heritage is an odd source of pride for the Australians that are and you should do more reading on what many of those convicts were a product of and the whole system of transportation.

>>6053911

Australia Day, based entirely on what it is the anniversary of, is by its very nature a flawed notion but it's a public holiday so we'll be stuck with this weird hybrid of a new foreign-kind of patriotism and just plain drunkenness for a while yet.

>>6053196

Good stuff, it's worth it. It's a long novel and it isn't Anglo-American, Russian or French so it gets kind of shafted. Nor is it getting any weird revival like Christina Stead did when Franzen name-dropped her.

Richardson's "The Getting of Wisdom" is probably more well known of her work especially since it had a decent film adaptation during the Australian New Wave and crops up more often on school lists. Nice little bildungsroman that would make a good comparative study with Mean Girls actually.

I enjoyed it but I think girls that went to private school love it more.

Also if you do enjoy Fortunes - try to track down one of her short story collections or go on Gutenberg AU for them. There's two (I think) shorts that are basically an odd epilogue that I wish they would just publish with the the rest of Fortunes as an appendix.

Honestly, Richard Mahony is one of my favourite novels and I actually bought a really nice edition from the 1930s just because.

>>6052465

I maintain the best Republican model for Australia would be one involving a fictional Queen based on Elizabeth II when she was hot.

>She will never fix your Falcodore with her WWII mechanic skills.

>>6052707

I felt obligated to read it because I had heard things about it from everyone. Just be prepared to give up rather than waste your time/put you off reading something else. Maybe give one of his shorter novels a go?

>>6052745

Make sure you read some reviews in your stride. I should add the words "I think" to what I was saying.

You'll have at least one moment of "What the hell am I reading?". I had fun but I need to definitely need to re-read it.

>>6052766

I was thinking in an international context. Timelines etc. But yes, interesting stuff!

>>6052787

Yes, and whilst it can be a slog (it is a trilogy of three volumes in one and the first takes a bit to get going) - it's a great character study and exploration of everything from colonial identity to mental illness. The last volume elevates it and the final chapters are just devestating.

Also you might really enjoy the middle volume where Mahony moves to England and has a shit time.

>>6052470

And I do think you raise an interesting notion which ties into the whole Australian penchant for Cultural cringe. The Bush romanticism of Banjo Paterson has a lot to answer for.

Actually I think I should recommend The Plains by Gerald Murnane. It's a fucking odd novel, it is set in the bush but it has a very tongue-in-cheek exploration of the use of regional Australia as a setting.


>>6052578

Australian history is fun like that.

I can forgive Queenslander's forgetting. They already forget how to not create a corrupt police state.

It's funny I've heard the argument that Watson's federal Labor government was the first socialist one in the world but I'm not entirely sure if that works.


>>6052614

I've only read two of his Ghost stories in Wordsworth's el-cheapo "Australian Ghost Stories". (A Strange Goldfield and The Death Child). I think I really liked the former but I had just visited Ballarat so was in the mood for it. Kind of want to read the Dr Nikola stuff.

>>6052470

Campaigning with Grant by Peter Minack

It's a post-modern Australian novel about the American Civil War as far away from all that as you can get. It's also out-of-print so not very helpful.

Have a look at the recommended list as most of it is actually pretty urban. Power Without Glory is set mostly in Collingwood for Christ's sake (although it's way too long and But The Dead Were Many is a better Frank Hardy novel).

>>6052472

I hated it and I wasn't one of those people that studied it at high-school. It is a bit of a perennial favourite among that whole English teacher set (the 30-something women mostly) but Tim Winton's whole style just doesn't work for me. The Fish chapters especially were just cringe-worthy. And the whole Family epic thing just screams "give me a fucking Miles Franklin".

I wish I could write something better on it but I honestly couldn't give a fuck. I am probably an idiot though. Give it a go, son. Your teacher might be right.

>>6052508

On The Beach is mostly in Melbourne itself. And seeing as I lived in a suburb right next to Harkaway etc. I maintain it is isn't country.

Definitely one of those "the premise carries the whole novel" deals but it worked for me.

Personal copy of /lit/'s Australian lit recommended chart with what I've read marked in red. If someone can find the normal one and post that'll be wicked because I can't seem to get it off the Wiki.

I'm hoping to actually read all of this year as a bit of a silly personal challenge but I've been saying that for ages and I'd rather just have read all of Patrick White's novels or something.

I really like what I've read of Patrick White (Voss, Tree of Man and Happy Valley) and highly recommend Voss. For those playing at home - Voss draws from Leichardt's last expedition and goes a bit Heart of Darkness/"man seeking to be God" with a bit of a metaphysical love story element to it. It's fun.

>>6052362

I still love how Mary Gilmore and all those socialists just said "fuck this" and started a commune in Paraguay.

>>6052372

It's amazing what you can achieve by taking the piss.

>>6052050

The relevant chapters in this.

And Martin/Caidin recommend the first two volumes of George Sansom's "A History of Japan 1334-1615" (The Cresset Press, 1961)

>>6052157
>>6052164

>>6052091

Australian contemporary poetry infested and in flames? Not entirely sure, I'm not that up on it.

I mean Les Murray's probably Nobel-able but he's got the whole Gibsonesque Catholic thing going for him and a slight contrarian streak (I mean he is lit editor at Quadrant).

Also everyone confuses him for a soccer commentator.

>>6052048

>Our greatest modernist poet was fictional.

Australia has literature. I think.
I mean, Paul Jennings is pretty rad.


>POEM OF THE DAY:

A.D. Hope's "Australia"
http://www.poetrylibrary.edu.au/poets/hope-a-d/australia-0146006

"Without songs, architecture, history:
The emotions and superstitions of younger lands,
Her rivers of water drown among inland sands,
The river of her immense stupidity"

The co-opting of Austen by the marketing notion of "chick lit" affects the critical faculties of many women (although just "women" in general is ridiculous) and their assessment of the character Mr Darcy. Austen is also frequently misinterpreted in a myriad of other ways (heh, "Austen is a feminist.") but that's all pretty moot.

Austen is worth reading for her brilliant use of irony, her insightful microscopic depiction of certain rungs of the ladder of English society of the time period but at the same instance making statements about the traits and character pitfalls we as human beings still fall into. and She also acts as a somewhat decent comparative anchor point for English literature from there on. I could go on but in the mood I'm in, I'm like to end up rambling on about how fascinating Persuasion is as a depiction of fucking PTSD and crap like that.

Most of her problems you'll probably have with her work, would revolve around not being able to handle the claustrophobic nature of that slice of society and Austen's worldview in general (or not cutting her some historical context slack). To which I say deal with it, or it's your loss.

Honestly most of Austen's flaws are her moralising getting annoying (mostly in Mansfield Park) and some structural issues and a few other niggles.

>>2353654

>salutes flag

>>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.

>>2353554

You can use this for next time.

>>2353528

Newtown? What happened to the old one?

>>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.

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.

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.

>>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.