Mateer writes: ' Burning Swans is a glimpse of iconoclasm, a moment through which an antipodean symbol burns with the light of an individual's past and an adopted country's ahistorical present. The disturbance in the poems is a recognition of loss. Personal relationships replace the abstraction of belief. Images are nourished by blood's pneumonic emotion. And energised by the charcoal after-image of words.'
'In his first collection of poems, John Mateer restlessly visits the tensions between past and present, himself and others, language and its loss. Experimental and frequently personal in approach, ranging from short lyrics to the sustained exploration of ideas, Burning Swans shows an exciting young poet at the beginning of his writing life.(From the inside cover of the work).'
Literary Migrations : White, English-Speaking Migrant Writers in Australia
Wollongong
:
2011
Z1860612
2011
single work
thesis
'In this thesis, I am arguing that [a] false core/periphery binary has made a particular group of migrants ,-those who are white and have migrated from English-speaking countries - invisible - invisible as migrants, that is. For the writers within this group, this leads to a critical blindness in relation to their work and place within Australian national literature. As a critic, however, I look at the work of Ruth Park, Alex Miller and John Mateer and see it is profoundly influenced by their migrant experience. More often than not they write about themes that are typical of migrant writing: alienation, identity, belonging, home, being in-between cultures, history. For a more appropriate, complete appreciation of their work, this thesis argues that it is imperative to go back to the beginning and return the 'default setting' of migrant to its literal meaning.' [From the author's abstract]
Literary Migrations : White, English-Speaking Migrant Writers in Australia
Wollongong
:
2011
Z1860612
2011
single work
thesis
'In this thesis, I am arguing that [a] false core/periphery binary has made a particular group of migrants ,-those who are white and have migrated from English-speaking countries - invisible - invisible as migrants, that is. For the writers within this group, this leads to a critical blindness in relation to their work and place within Australian national literature. As a critic, however, I look at the work of Ruth Park, Alex Miller and John Mateer and see it is profoundly influenced by their migrant experience. More often than not they write about themes that are typical of migrant writing: alienation, identity, belonging, home, being in-between cultures, history. For a more appropriate, complete appreciation of their work, this thesis argues that it is imperative to go back to the beginning and return the 'default setting' of migrant to its literal meaning.' [From the author's abstract]
