'Geoffrey Blainey is often described as Australia’s greatest living historian, a writer whose prolific output includes such iconic books about the country’s past as The Tyranny of Distance and Triumph of the Nomads.
'However, Blainey has also been a controversial figure. His 1984 comments about Asian immigration triggered a major political controversy. In turn, the reaction of his critics raised fundamental questions about freedom of speech and set the scene for the ‘history wars’ fought out in Australia over the past three decades.
'Many academic historians were amongst Blainey’s critics. After 1984, Blainey became stereotyped as a ‘conservative historian’ and thus outside the bounds of academic history, yet much of Blainey’s historical writing, both in method and outlook, has been far from conservative.
'Geoffrey Blainey: Writer, Historian, Controversialist challenges simplistic descriptions of Blainey’s work. It sheds an important light not just on Blainey’s career, but also on the past and present practice of history in Australia.'
Source: Publisher's blurb.
'In Geoffrey Blainey: Writer, Historian, Controversialist, Richard Allsop provides a welcome study of a remarkable, and remarkably polarising, intellectual figure in Australian public life. Placing Blainey with Keith Hancock and Manning Clark in the pantheon of Australia’s leading historians, Allsop observes that, unlike them, Blainey’s body of work has not been comprehensively examined. He sets out to remedy this and to meet the need identified by Graeme Davison 20 years ago for a “more mature” review of Blainey’s writing—one that resists “reading his earlier work for signs of the emerging controversialist” (xiii). From this perspective, Allsop largely succeeds.' (Introduction)
'Geoffrey Blainey and his lawyers have shown a close interest in this book. Author Richard Allsop has little to say about the bumpy journey to publication, recording cryptically that Blainey gave early encouragement and assistance to the project – originally a Monash University doctoral thesis – and then that he withdrew support. But although Allsop does not mention this himself, it is on the public record that an earlier plan to publish had to be abandoned after a threat of legal action from Blainey's lawyer (The Australian, 29–30 October 2016).' (Introduction)
'Geoffrey Blainey and his lawyers have shown a close interest in this book. Author Richard Allsop has little to say about the bumpy journey to publication, recording cryptically that Blainey gave early encouragement and assistance to the project – originally a Monash University doctoral thesis – and then that he withdrew support. But although Allsop does not mention this himself, it is on the public record that an earlier plan to publish had to be abandoned after a threat of legal action from Blainey's lawyer (The Australian, 29–30 October 2016).' (Introduction)
'In Geoffrey Blainey: Writer, Historian, Controversialist, Richard Allsop provides a welcome study of a remarkable, and remarkably polarising, intellectual figure in Australian public life. Placing Blainey with Keith Hancock and Manning Clark in the pantheon of Australia’s leading historians, Allsop observes that, unlike them, Blainey’s body of work has not been comprehensively examined. He sets out to remedy this and to meet the need identified by Graeme Davison 20 years ago for a “more mature” review of Blainey’s writing—one that resists “reading his earlier work for signs of the emerging controversialist” (xiii). From this perspective, Allsop largely succeeds.' (Introduction)
