Cirrus@Austlit

'Antipodes mourns three important losses to Australian literature in the past six months: the novelist and short story writer Liam Davison, lost in the crash of MH17 over eastern Ukraine; the poet Martin Harrison, who died in September; and the short story writer and novelist Morris Lurie, who passed away in October. Lurie was a comic master who published early on in The New Yorker and was an early reviewer of Peter Carey; Harrison's poetry registered the impact of Australia's natural beauty in as resonant a way as has ever occurred; Davison's The White Woman was one of the most subtle fictional explorations of questions of race, gender, identity, and colonialism in the Australian fictional landscape. All three gave so much to Australian literature; all died too early, and will be much missed.' (Publication abstract)

'For four decades Murray Bail's writing has been at the forefront of inventive and intellectual challenging Australian fiction, yet his preoccupations remain elusive, his works enigmatic. His first book, Contemporary Portraits and Other Stories, signalled the arrival of a major talent, an expectation matched by subsequent award-winning novels, such as Homesickness and Eucalyptus. His work, however, has been often accused of inventiveness for its own sake. Here, Ackland discusses Bail's Homesickness.' (Publication summary)

'The US edition of Shirley Hazzard's The Great Fire is spangled with flames and names. Despite its dramatic cover, Hazzard's novel has largely escaped critical attention. Although applauded for her profound sensitivity and emotional microscopy, Hazzard wins less acclaim than one might expect. Here, De Vinne examines Hazzard's The Great Fire.' (Publication summary)

'Although she has written two impressive volumes of poetry, The Painted Lady in 2006 and The Love Procession in 2012, the Canberra poet Suzanne Edgar has not yet received the critical attention she clearly merits. Here, Beston examines the works of Edgar who began her literary career with a book of short stories, Counting Back and Other Stories published in 1991. Born and educated in Adelaide, Edgar came to Canberra as a young woman with her husband Peter. She taught Women's Studies at the Australian National University and was a contributing editor with the Dictionary of Australian Biography for over twenty years. Edgar's total output of poems is close to two hundred and fifty, often complex in thought, always clear in expression. The lack of critical attention to Edgar's poetry needs to be redressed, for her books belong alongside those of the outstanding women poets of her lifetime in Australia.' (Publication summary)

'Beston interviews poet Suzanne Edgar. Among other things, Edgar considers creativity as quite central in her life. She watch very little television, not out of snobbery but because it is a passive activity. She stays active, either writing or learning more about her craft and its practitioners. She spend about twenty hours a week writing.' (Publication summary)

'Kar examines from an Indian perspective the issues of inseparable engagement of the Australian Aboriginal poets with the trope of the "other". The Australian Aboriginal poets' engagement with the trope of the "other" is not surprising at all if one keeps in mind the history of colonization in Australia, the highly racialized policy of assimilation. He implies not one but three points of view. These are the point of view of a teacher who teaches Australian Aboriginal poetry to Indian students, the point of view that the subject position of an educated, privileged, upper-caste Indian (who is not a participant in but an observer of what has been happening in Australia for the past few years or so) creates, and, finally, the point of view that an Indian academic, of late, has offered on issues relating to identity and violence.' (Publication summary)

'The family, as the primary unit of society, has been of great interest for sociologists and anthropologists. They have been interested in the structure of the family, the norms, experiences, anxieties, ideology, values, and rules that govern it along with the roles played by different members to achieve its complex equilibrium. Family and home are crucial sites for South Asian immigrants in Australia, as it provides them an anchoring–roots for socializing, teaching children inherited cultural values, structuring roles, and domestic divisions. Here, Sarwal examines migration of families and the carrying over of socio-cultural structures that are presented in the works of short story writers of South Asian diaspora in Australia. He emphasizes the ways in which the family experience of migrating and integrating into Australia from the Indian subcontinent has affected the immigrants' choices in life.' (Publication summary)

'Since the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran and the ensuing economic, political, and intellectual restrictions, a significant number of Iranian writers have settled abroad, primarily in Western countries. Some were already writers in Iran and continued their work in the diaspora; some started to write in their new country; some write in Persian and some in English or other European languages. In-betweenness is a common theme that runs through exilic Iranian texts, but this is expressed differently depending on the writer's relation to his/her host country, to the homeland, and to the diasporic space. This feeling of in-betweenness comes to create a Third Space that is emblematic of contemporary Iranian writings and to a large extent reflects diasporic writing. Nanquette questions how the transnational movement of Iranian writers, including Granaz Moussavi, cements the Third Space and will bring new findings to the concept of Third Space as applied to Australia.' (Publication summary)