Cynthia Van Den Driesen Cynthia Van Den Driesen i(A11140 works by) (a.k.a. Cynthia A. Vanden Driesen; Cynthia vanden Driesen)
Gender: Female
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1 4 y separately published work icon Patrick White Centenary : The Legacy of a Prodigal Son Cynthia Van Den Driesen (editor), Bill Ashcroft (editor), Newcastle upon Tyne : Cambridge Scholars Press , 2014 7902410 2014 anthology criticism

'This volume marks the birth centenary of a giant amongst contemporary writers: the Australian Nobel prize-winning novelist, Patrick White (1912–1990). It proffers an invaluable insight into the current state of White studies through commentaries drawn from an international galaxy of eminent critics, as well as from newer talents. The book proves that interest in White’s work continues to grow and diversify.

'Every essay offers a new insight: some are re-evaluations by seasoned critics who revise earlier positions significantly; others admit new light onto what has seemed like well-trodden terrain or focus on works perhaps undervalued in the past—his poetry, an early short story or novel—which are now subjected to fresh attention. His posthumous work has also won attention from prominent critics. New comparisons with other international writers have been drawn in terms of subject matter, themes and philosophy.

'The expansion of critical attention into fields like photography and film opens new possibilities for enhancing further appreciation of his work. White’s interest in public issues such as the treatment of Australia’s Indigenous peoples, human rights and Australian nationalism is refracted through the inclusion of relevant commentaries from notable contributors.

'For the first time in Australian literary history, Indigenous scholars have participated in a celebration of the work of a white Australian writer. All of this highlights a new direction in White studies – the appreciation of his stature as a public intellectual. The book demonstrates that White’s legacy has limitless possibilities for further growth.' (Publisher's abstract)

1 Introduction Cynthia Van Den Driesen , 2014 single work criticism
— Appears in: Patrick White Centenary : The Legacy of a Prodigal Son 2014; (p. xiii)
'White is known to have speculated, at times, as to whether his works would be read after his death. That his reputation is in no danger of fading is surely attested by this birth centenary publication – the outcome of a conference held in India in December, 2012. It was attended by some of the best-known of White scholars as well as some excellent new contributors from all over the world; the latter being a promising augury for the future. White had an awareness of Indian culture, though it was his wide acquaintance with European culture that saturated his work, along with his deep roots in his native Australia. Perhaps it needs to be stated here that the epigraph to White’s earliest novel, Happy Valley (1939) was a quotation from Gandhi; and his earliest published short story, “The Twitching Colonel” (1937) records the experience of a retired British colonel who is literally consumed, it would appear, by what he has experienced in India.' (Introduction)
1 Sea-change or Atrophy? The Australian Convict Inheritance Cynthia Van Den Driesen , 2011 single work criticism
— Appears in: Coolabah , no. 5 2011;
This paper is an offshoot of a larger project which explored the possibility for the erstwhile settler-colonizer undergoing the sea-change into settler-indigene emergent through a study of selected novels of Patrick White. It became apparent to me that the convict figure, who played an ancillary role in these works, could lay claim to the status of white indigene well ahead of the main protagonist. Robert Hughes (in The Fatal Shore) discredits the idea of any bonding between the convict and the Aborigine but acknowledges examples of "white blackfellas"—white men who had successfully been adopted into Aboriginal societies. Martin Tucker's nineteenth century work, Ralph Rashleigh, offers surprising testimony of a creative work which bears this out in a context where Australian literature generally reflected the national amnesia with regard to the Aborigine and barely accorded them human status. Grenville's The Secret River (2005), based broadly on the history of her own ancestor, appears to support Hughes' original contention but is also replete with ambivalences that work against a simple resolution. This paper will explore some of the ambivalences, the 'food for thought' on aspects of the Australian experience highlighted by these literary texts, and glances briefly also at variations on the theme in Carey's Jack Maggs and the The True Story of the Kelly Gang. (Author's abstract)
1 y separately published work icon Change - Conflict and Convergence : Austral-Asian Scenarios Cynthia Van Den Driesen (editor), Ian H. Van Den Driesen (editor), New Delhi : Orient Blackswan , 2010 Z1820359 2010 single work criticism 'This is the fourth volume in the series of Australian-Asian Association publications and carries on the interdisciplinary and international tradition of the same. The intensely provocative theme of 'change' is traced through motifs of convergence or conflict across a multiplicity of disciplines. The volume has attracted contributions from some of the best-known authorities in their different fields. The papers cover subjects ranging from Sri Lankan cricket to diplomacy on the world scene; from literary 'blogging' to trade performance; from Bollywood audiences to aboriginal rights in Australia and the development of Australian studies in Spain; from a nineteenth-century Shakespeare production in Sri Lanka to a performance of Bizet's 'The Pearl Fishers' in Sydney. They cover the phenomenon of change as it manifests itself in a range of disciplines and highlight shared commonalities as well as contrasted experiences and perspectives. The book is a record of the richness of the dialogue between disparate groups connected by scholarly interest and intellectual curiosity, in fact, a global academic community.' (Publisher's blurb)
1 From “a Shrew from the Orkneys” to White Indigene : Re-inventions of Eliza Fraser Cynthia Van Den Driesen , 2009 single work criticism
— Appears in: Coolabah , no. 3 2009; (p. 35-42)

'Few episodes in postcolonial Australian history have shown so remarkable a capacity to generate ever-increasing cross-fertilisations between myth, history and memory than the narratives centred on Eliza Fraser. The archive of materials surrounding the shipwreck of this British woman and her brief sojourn among the indigenous people of the Badtjala community of Fraser Island in the nineteenth century continues to grow.

Kay Schaffer's impressive work overtook earlier studies of the phenomenon but concentrates mainly on the many European re-constructions of the episode .The fecundity of the materials is far from exhausted. This paper explores some of the Aboriginal reactions to the tale but its main focus is Patrick White's novel A Fringe of Leaves, which grew out of his own research and constructs a new myth with implications for the nation. It is a work with the potential for developing (in Jim Davidson's words) "a myth of reconciliation, and possibilities of growth." This paper shows White's melding of history, myth, memory and imagination in this novel is illustrative of the literary artist's contribution to "writing the nation." ' Source: Cynthia vanden Driesen.

1 Rewriting Europe : Carey's 'Jack Maggs' and Malouf's 'Remembering Babylon' Cynthia Van Den Driesen , 2009 single work criticism
— Appears in: A Sea for Encounters : Essays towards a Postcolonial Commonwealth 2009; (p. 307-322)
The article discusses Carey's Jack Maggs and David Malouf's Remembering Babylon 'as works that dismantle [the] traditional and hallowed image of the European Self and, in the process of that writing-back, to reverse the binaries constructed in the discourse of orientalism of the non-European world as the image of all that was dark and reprehensible' (p. 310).
1 7 y separately published work icon Writing the Nation : Patrick White and the Indigene Cynthia Van Den Driesen , Amsterdam New York (City) : Rodopi , 2009 Z1552502 2009 single work criticism

'The time for new approaches to White's work is overdue. Central to the present study are Edward Said's ideas about the role of the intellectual (and the writer) - of speaking "truth to power," and also the importance of tracing the "affiliations" of a text and its embeddedness in the world. This approach is not incompatible with Jung's theory of the 'great' artist and his capacity to answer the deep-seated psychic needs of his people.

'White's work has contributed in many different ways to the writing of the nation. The spiritual needs of a young nation such as Australia must also comprehend its continual urge towards self-definition. Explored here is one important aspect of that challenge: white Australia's dealings with the indigenous people of the land, tracing the significance of the Aboriginal presence in three texts selected from the oeuvre of Patrick White: Voss (1957), Riders in the Chariot (1961), and A Fringe of Leaves (1976). Each of these texts interrogates European culture's denigration of the non-European Other as embedded in the discourse of orientalism.

'One central merit of White's commanding perspective is the constant close attention he pays to European hubris and to the paramount autonomy of indigenous culture. There is evidence even of a project which can be articulated as a search for the possibility of white indigeneity, the potential for the white settler's belonging within the land as does the indigene.' (Publisher's website)

1 S. Asian Odysseys in Australia - W/Here Is 'Home'? South Asian Odysseys in Australia - Where Is 'Home'? Cynthia Van Den Driesen , 2005 single work criticism
— Appears in: Diaspora : The Australasian Experience 2005; (p. 220-231)
This is a short, comparative account of the works listed which examines the portrayal of Australia and Australians in each text. Driesen chooses not to emphasise issues relating to displacement and loss (what she terms 'the shadow-side of the experience of diaspora'), focusing instead on the positive aspects of migration.
1 1 y separately published work icon Diaspora : The Australasian Experience Cynthia Van Den Driesen (editor), Ralph J. Crane (editor), New Delhi : Prestige Books , 2005 Z1396321 2005 anthology autobiography criticism essay extract poetry prose
1 2 y separately published work icon Austral-Asian Encounters : From Literature and Women's Studies to Politics and Tourism Cynthia Van Den Driesen (editor), Satendra Nandan (editor), New Delhi : Prestige Books , 2003 Z1141845 2003 anthology criticism prose

'This collection of papers signals the emergence of innovative developments in Australian Studies. In the area of cultural theory, some of the brightest talents from Australia, New Zealand and India theorize the fresh insights emerging through exploration of the commonalities of the shared colonial and postcolonial experience of these regions.' (Publication summary)

1 The (Ad)Missions of the Colonizer : Australian Paradigms in Selected Works of Prichard, Malouf and White Cynthia Van Den Driesen , 2002 single work criticism
— Appears in: Missions of Interdependence : A Literary Directory 2002; (p. 309-319)
Taking its starting point from Said's Orientalism (1978) which 'shows how the discourse of "otherness" became entrenched in the cultural texts of Europe', this essay explores 'how that vaunted superiorityof the European, in comparison with the endemic inferiority of the non-European, is interrogated by three Australian writers' (309).
1 [Review] Writing the Nation : Patrick White and the Indigene Cynthia Van Den Driesen , 2000- single work review
— Appears in: Cercles 2000-;

— Review of Writing the Nation : Patrick White and the Indigene Cynthia Van Den Driesen , 2009 single work criticism
1 2 y separately published work icon New Directions in Australian Studies : Papers of the Inaugural Conference of The Asian Association for the Study of Australia (ASAA), "Creative Configurations", Kerala, India (1997) Cynthia Van Den Driesen (editor), Adrian Mitchell (editor), New Delhi : Prestige Books , 2000 Z947982 2000 anthology prose
1 1 y separately published work icon Celebrations : Fifty Years of Sri-Lanka-Australia Interactions Cynthia Van Den Driesen (editor), Ian H. Van Den Driesen (editor), Colombo : Government Printer (Sri Lanka) , 1999 Z947910 1999 anthology poetry autobiography short story
1 Bakhtinian Polyphones in Patrck White's Texts Cynthia Van Den Driesen , 1998 single work criticism
— Appears in: Commonwealth and American Nobel Laureates in Literature : Essays in Criticism 1998; (p. 83-95)
Discusses a number of different theoretical perspectives of previous White criticism and various readings of his works, and argues that a Bakhtinian approach, alerting readers to the polyphonic nature of the text, is a rewarding new approach to White's complex fiction.
1 y separately published work icon An Anthology of Australian Literature Hoju munhak chonjip Ch'oe Chin-yong (editor), Cynthia Van Den Driesen (editor), Seoul : Hansin Munhwasa , 1995 Z994880 1995 anthology poetry short story
1 Kindling Australian Studies in Korea Cynthia Van Den Driesen , 1995 single work criticism
— Appears in: Centering the Margins : Perspectives on Literatures in English from India, Africa, Australia 1995; (p. 133-138)
1 Asian Writing in Australia Cynthia Van Den Driesen , 1995 single work criticism
— Appears in: Centering the Margins : Perspectives on Literatures in English from India, Africa, Australia 1995; (p. 109-119)
1 3 y separately published work icon Centering the Margins : Perspectives on Literatures in English from India, Africa, Australia Cynthia Van Den Driesen , New Delhi : Prestige Books , 1995 Z861889 1995 multi chapter work criticism
2 'Devils', 'Savages', 'Nobler Forms': Post-Colonial Re-Inventions of the Indigene in Work of Patrick White Cynthia Van Den Driesen , 1995 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australia's Changing Landscapes : Proceedings of the Second EASA Conference : Sitges, Barcelona, October 1993 1995; (p. 86-95)

— Appears in: Centering the Margins : Perspectives on Literatures in English from India, Africa, Australia 1995; (p. 96-108)
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