image of person or book cover 129104288797054943.jpg
Image courtesy of publisher's website.
y separately published work icon Birds of Passage single work   novel  
Issue Details: First known date: 1983... 1983 Birds of Passage
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'Birds of Passage is the powerful and haunting story of Seamus O'Young, an Australian-born Chinese, on a collision course with the past.

'He reconstructs his past through the eyes of Shan, an ancestor who came to Australia in the 1880s. And, just as Shan was driven from the goldfields by depravity, racism and sheer greed; so Seamus finds himself, a century later, fighting for his own life and sanity.'

Source: Goodreads.

Exhibitions

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • Sydney, New South Wales,: Allen and Unwin , 1983 .
      image of person or book cover 129104288797054943.jpg
      Image courtesy of publisher's website.
      Extent: 157p.
      Reprinted: 1984
      ISBN: 0868614041, 0868611263
    • North Ryde, Ryde - Gladesville - Hunters Hill area, Northwest Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales,: Sirius Books , 1989 .
      image of person or book cover 2342045059102787240.jpg
      Extent: 157p.
      ISBN: 0207161488 (pbk.)
      Series: Sirius Books Sirius Quality Paperbacks Angus and Robertson (publisher), series - publisher
    • St Leonards, North Sydney - Lane Cove area, Sydney Northern Suburbs, Sydney, New South Wales,: Allen and Unwin , 1993 .
      Extent: 157p.
      ISBN: 1863734988 (pbk.)
    • St Leonards, North Sydney - Lane Cove area, Sydney Northern Suburbs, Sydney, New South Wales,: Allen and Unwin , 1999 .
      image of person or book cover 7097803663178439328.jpg
      ISBN: 1865080578
    • Melbourne, Victoria,: Untapped , 2021 .
      image of person or book cover 4742577431822454176.png
      Image courtesy of publisher's website.
      Extent: 1v.p.
      ISBN: 9781922730480
    • Sydney, New South Wales,: Brio Books ; Untapped , 2022 .
      image of person or book cover 3433564696905245550.png
      Image courtesy of publisher's website.
      Extent: 164p.p.
      Note/s:
      • Published 25 October 2022.
      ISBN: 9781761280764
Form: audiobook

Works about this Work

The Making of the Asian Australian Novel Emily Yu Zong , 2023 single work criticism
— Appears in: The Cambridge History of the Australian Novel 2023;

'The making of the Asian Australian novel is the unmaking of oppressive notions of history, subjectivity and literary form. Locating ethnic representational politics within power structures of race and nation, this chapter contends that Asian Australian identity is a site of hybrid instability realised through nonlinear forms of storytelling. The chapter examines national and diasporic paradigms across historical and contemporary trajectories of this literature: earlier Chinese Australian novels that blur boundaries between fictional and factual claims; Bildungsroman novels that trouble ethnocentric narratives of either assimilation or return; multicultural novels that unveil ongoing racism in liberal-pluralist ideals; and transnational novels that reimagine the Australian relationship with postcolonial and globalising Asian modernity. Reflecting on the limits of a critical humanist agenda, the chapter identifies an alternative paradigm of Asian Australian storytelling that employs speculative tactics to depict the land, species, climate change and Asian–Indigenous connections. This ecocritical paradigm challenges a normative ideal of the modern, autonomous and sovereign individual as one the migrant subject should integrate into, while pointing to an under-explored terrain for Asian Australian writers whose focus on diversity and justice would offer important insights into the shifting human condition.'

Source: Author's summary.

Detours and Divagations Brian Castro , 2019 single work essay
— Appears in: Meanjin Online 2019;
y separately published work icon Reckoning with the Past : Family Historiographies in Postcolonial Australian Literature Ashley Barnwell , Joseph Cummins , Abingdon : Routledge , 2018 17218286 2018 single work criticism

'This is the first book to examine how Australian fiction writers draw on family histories to reckon with the nation's colonial past. Located at the intersection of literature, history, and sociology, it explores the relationships between family storytelling, memory, and postcolonial identity. With attention to the political potential of family histories, Reckoning with the Past argues that authors' often autobiographical works enable us to uncover, confront, and revise national mythologies. An important contribution to the emerging global conversation about multidirectional memory and the need to attend to the effects of colonisation, this book will appeal to an interdisciplinary field of scholarly readers. '

Source: Publisher's blurb.

Pacific Studies : Quo Vadis? Anne Holden Rønning , 2014 single work criticism
— Appears in: Coolabah , no. 13 2014; (p. 23-34)

'Looking back to the past this paper discusses why Pacific studies and in particular Australasian studies became an area of interest in tertiary education in Europe. What subject areas initiated these studies, and how do past legacies shape the present? With cutbacks in higher education over the past two decades the future of interdisciplinary studies and the humanities looks bleak. At the same time due to global business and increased political communication across borders there is a vibrant interest in and need for such studies among businesses and students. For most Europeans the literature of settler countries, with their European legacy, makes access to ways of thought and culture easier than studies of countries with other mythological backgrounds. In today’s multicultural environment such studies can provide knowledge for an understanding of other cultures and increase tolerance of the ‘other’. Area studies have relevance to our situation in Europe with increased migrancy, not least as a result of Schengen and EU regulations. ' (Author's abstract)

Degrees of Transparency in Brian Castro's Birds of Passage and After China Marjorie Aambrosio , 2012 single work criticism
— Appears in: Commonwealth Essays and Studies , Autumn vol. 35 no. 1 2012; (p. 73-82)
'This essay intends to highlight how Brian Castro's Birds of Passage (1983) and After China (1992) waver between transparency and opacity. It explores some of the techniques employed - among which a blurring of categories and a questioning of narratorial reliability - in order to create what Roland Barthes calls a "text of bliss" - one which challenges the limits of language as a means of communication.' (Author's abstract)
Travelling Birds Graham Burns , 1984 single work review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , May no. 60 1984; (p. 17-18)

— Review of Getting Away with It : A Novel Kevin Brophy , 1982 single work novel ; Birds of Passage Brian Castro , 1983 single work novel
Distinguished Fiction Frank Kellaway , 1983 single work review
— Appears in: Overland , December no. 93 1983; (p. 65-66)

— Review of Birds of Passage Brian Castro , 1983 single work novel ; Over Here, Harv! Bruce Dawe , 1983 selected work short story ; Hostages Fay Zwicky , 1983 selected work short story ; Headlocks & Other Stories Barry Hill , 1983 selected work short story
Serious and Impressive But Disjointed Novel Mark Thomas , 1983 single work review
— Appears in: The Canberra Times , 8 October 1983; (p. 19)

— Review of Birds of Passage Brian Castro , 1983 single work novel
Winging Towards Elusive Heights Nick Creech , 1983 single work review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian Magazine , 20-21 August 1983; (p. 15)

— Review of Birds of Passage Brian Castro , 1983 single work novel
Dead Jumbuck Nicholas Jose , 1984 single work review
— Appears in: The Age Monthly Review , January 1984; (p. 19-20)

— Review of Birds of Passage Brian Castro , 1983 single work novel ; Matilda, My Darling Nigel Krauth , 1983 single work novel
Looking (North-) West to the East : Some Thoughts on the Asianisation of Australian Literature Graham Huggan , 1992 single work criticism
— Appears in: The Making of a Pluralist Australia 1950-1990: Selected Papers from the Inaugural EASA Conference 1991 1992; (p. 219-227)
Wang Guanglin : An Interview with Brian Castro (9/11/2001) Wang Guanglin (interviewer), 2004 single work interview
— Appears in: Being and Becoming : On Cultural Identity of Diasporic Chinese Writers in America and Australia 2004; (p. 324-334)
Decentring Orientalist and Ocker Masculinities in Birds of Passage Kam Louie , 2005 single work essay
— Appears in: Culture, Identity, Commodity : Diasporic Chinese Literature in English 2005; (p. 183-204)
Appropriating National Myths : Brian Castro's 'Birds of Passage' Marilyne Brun , 2008 single work criticism
— Appears in: Fact and Fiction : Readings in Australian Literature 2008; (p. 227-239)
Writing Chinese Diaspora : After the 'White Australia Policy' Deborah L. Madsen , 2009 single work criticism
— Appears in: Reading Down Under : Australian Literary Studies Reader 2009; (p. 263-270) Australian Made : A Multicultural Reader 2010; (p. 158-172)
An overview of Chinese-Australian writing.
Last amended 5 Nov 2024 14:53:46
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