Issue Details: First known date: 2022... 2022 Alternative Histories of the Anthropocene : Andrew McGahan's 'The Rich Man's House'
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'Andrew McGahan's final novel, The Rich Man's House (2019), collates many of the preoccupations of his literary career: power, the environment, and the precarious foundations of colonisation in Australia. This paper posits that the novel's commentary on human overreach is an alternative history that encapsulates the Anthropocene and explores the problematic, gendered dimensions of conquest and its representation. Situated within a broad and growing literary scholarship that explores the innovative application of ecological frameworks, the paper interrogates the novel's critique of intersecting erasures of coloniality, masculinist domination and historical certitude. It suggests that the disaster visited upon the characters of The Rich Man's House is a demonstration of a specific phenomenon: ecologist Barry Commoner's fourth rule of ecology - nature always bats last. This paper also contributes to scholarship on McGahan's oeuvre, noting that his final work is prescient in its awareness of increasing climate disaster.' (Publication abstract)

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    y separately published work icon Social Alternatives Focus on Fiction vol. 41 no. 3 November 2022 25516535 2022 periodical issue

    'For forty-five years, Social Alternatives has included fiction to probe socio-political issues. This issue brings fiction to the fore. Consistent with some earlier special issues (2021, 2013, 2009), we also include analysis of fiction as part of our commitment to a multidisciplinary platform for critical alternatives to oppressive norms. And in celebrating 45 years, our focus was necessarily broad. Social Alternatives believes that multiple mediums are beneficial in the promotion of public debates. Fictional representations of socio-economic and political concerns generate imaginative solutions to our current conditions. The founders of Social Alternatives consider fiction fundamental for the sharing of rigorous and fresh perspectives in the collective effort to navigate contemporary issues.' (Thu Hoang, Ginna Brock : Introduction)

    2022
    pg. 37-42
Last amended 26 Apr 2023 14:02:40
37-42 Alternative Histories of the Anthropocene : Andrew McGahan's 'The Rich Man's House'small AustLit logo Social Alternatives
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