Desert Worlds single work   essay  
Issue Details: First known date: 2019... 2019 Desert Worlds
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'In late 1914, twenty thousand mostly young Australian men ventured forth from the driest inhabited continent on earth to cross the ocean in a convoy spread over twenty-five kilometres in length and measuring twenty kilometres in width. The greatest mass exodus from the Antipodes which included a further ten thousand New Zealanders, this was the first and largest of many similar voyages over the next four years. The Australians might have considered themselves to be desert people. “The sand has his own / Wave and motion,” wrote S. Musgrove in “Australia Deserta” in the first issue of Southerly in 1939, “Rages the bed / Of the stony ocean” (14). Yet they preferred to identify as colonial sons returning to the motherland of pastoral England before heading to war. Of their own place, “They call her a young country but they lie,” wrote A. D. Hope in his much debated poem “Australia” which he began writing around the time of the publication of the inaugural issue—and to which he contributed an essay—“She is the last of lands, the emptiest, / ... the womb within is dry” (Hope).' 

 (Introduction)

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

  • Appears in:
    y separately published work icon Southerly Southerly 80! vol. 79 no. 1 2019 18439965 2019 periodical issue

    'Southerly has turned 80! Founded in 1939, Southerly has been published continuously for fully four score years. This is a cause for great celebration; we salute the many, many writers whose poetry, fiction, essays and reviews Southerly has published, often providing new writers with their first foray into publication. In their submissions of work for this issue, many writers recall the significance of these first works, some dating from 50 and 60 years ago.

     

    'Alongside literary stalwarts, and in keeping with Southerly‘s committed practice, new writers reflect the matrices of contemporary Australia’s peoples and literatures. Juxtapositions of this kind are at the heart of Southerly‘s project and span the spectrum of writing across creative and critical modes.

     

    'Southerly also salutes the generations of readers who have engaged with this enterprise, the many who continue to access Southerly‘s formidable archive from 1939, and our current readership.' (Editorial)

    2019
    pg. 84-105
Last amended 13 Dec 2019 11:37:26
84-105 Desert Worldssmall AustLit logo Southerly
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Subjects:
  • Alexandria,
    c
    Egypt,
    c
    North Africa, Africa,
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