Cirrus@Austlit

'Patrick White, the first and only Australian writer who won the Nobel Prize for Literature has to his credit a number of works of long fiction in which he has delved into the various aspects of human relationships. This paper, however, will focus on White’s collection of shorter fiction, The Cockatoos where he has dealt with the themes of the interactions of man and nature. The focus will be on three short stories in this collection, “A Woman’s Hand”, “Five Twenty” and “The Cockatoos” in which the writer has shown the tragic consequences of man’s interactions with nature and his fellow human beings in spite of their best intentions.' (Publication abstract)