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y separately published work icon Bengala, or, Some Time Ago single work   novel  
Issue Details: First known date: 1860... 1860 Bengala, or, Some Time Ago
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

Described as a "gothic romance" by Gerry Turcotte, Bengala, Or, Some Time Ago follows the successes and misfortunes of two families, the Langs and the Herberts, in colonial New South Wales.

Contents

* Contents derived from the Kensington, Randwick area, Sydney Eastern Suburbs, Sydney, New South Wales,:University of New South Wales Press , 1990 version. Please note that other versions/publications may contain different contents. See the Publication Details.
Bengala or Some Time Ago [1990] : Editor's Introduction, Susan McKernan , single work criticism biography
McKernan provides biographical information and an account of the composition, publication and reception of Bengala in this introduction to her edition of the novel.
(p. xiii-xxxi)

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

Works about this Work

Settler Colonial Fictions : Beyond Nationalism and Universalism Paul Giles , 2023 single work criticism
— Appears in: The Cambridge Companion to the Australian Novel 2023; (p. 54-68)

'Paradoxically, Australian nationalist accounts have tended to slight the earliest Australian literature by white settlers from the nineteenth century. This chapter surveys the literary history of this period, examining writers such as Oliné Keese, Ada Cambridge, Henry Kingsley, Rosa Praed, and Catherine Helen Spence. Drawing connections between these writers and the transnational Anglophone literary world centering on Great Britain and the United States, this chapter takes a comparative perspective that at once acknowledges the peripheral standing of these Australian texts and argues for their relevance to the history of the novel in English.' (Publication abstract)

The Literary Text as Historical Artifact : The Colonial Couple in Australian Romantic Fiction by Women, 1838-1860 Jodi McAlister , 2018 single work criticism
— Appears in: Lilith , no. 24 2018; (p. 38-51)

'This article inverts the title of Hayden White's 1974 essay 'The Historical Text as Literary Artifact' by exploring literary texts as historical artifacts. It uses three novels published by Australian women writers in the mid-nineteenth century - Catherine Helen Spence's Clara Morison (1854), Caroline Louisa Atkinson's Gertrude the Emigrant (1857), and Mary Theresa Vidal's 'Bengala, or Some Time Ago' (1860) - 'as historical sources to explore the emotional culture of colonial Australia in regard to romantic love. Following Sarah Pinto, this article takes the romantic couple as the centre of its analysis, and asks four key questions of the novels in the corpus: What kind of people fall in love? Who do they fall in love with? What kind of love do they fall in? And how do their lives and their loves interact with the colonial Australian landscape? It finds that romantic love in these novels is dependent on romanticised similarity and shared sensibility rather than eroticised otherness. It argues that while this might not necessarily be uniquely nationally distinctive, the Australian chronotopic context means that this narrative would have strong and specific resonances with a female colonial audience.'  (Publication abstract)

 

The Gothic Trail : The Guardian's Place in Australian Gothic Tradition Gillian Polack , 2018 single work essay
— Appears in: Aurealis , no. 114 2018; (p. 41-45)
Unsettled Status in Australian Settler Novels Dorice Williams Elliott , 2011 single work criticism
— Appears in: Victorian Settler Narratives : Emigrants, Cosmopolitans and Returnees in Nineteenth-Century Literature 2011; (p. 23-40)

'The genteel society Vidal depicts is composed primarily of former tradesmen and shabby gentry from England who have managed to increase their fortunes in Australia and aspire to gentility, along with the convict or former convict servants who work for them and serve as signs of that gentility. A key aspect of Trollope's Harry Heathcote is that, as we have seen, it includes the reconciliation of a genteel squatter with a free-selector, albeit an exceptionally gentlemanly one. The squatter novels may well have contributed to this process of presenting white Australians, especially their leaders, as positive and capable figures in the English imagination. It is thus reasonable to argue that squatter novels such as Trollope's Harry Heathcote and Vidal's Bengala were part of the cultural work of creating a united Australian gentry that in turn provided both political and moral leadership for white Australians generally.'

Source: Abstract.

Beyond the Wattle: Recent Perspectives on Australian Colonial Literature Michael Ackland , 1999 single work criticism
— Appears in: Bibliographical Society of Australia and New Zealand Bulletin , Second Quarter vol. 23 no. 2 1999; (p. 116-127)
Untitled Shirley Walker , 1992 single work review
— Appears in: Australian Literary Studies , May vol. 15 no. 3 1992; (p. 238-241)

— Review of Ada Cambridge : Her Life and Work 1844-1926 Audrey Tate , 1991 single work biography ; Bengala, or, Some Time Ago Mary Theresa Vidal , 1860 single work novel ; Thirty Years in Australia Ada Cambridge , 1903 single work autobiography ; Pioneer Writer : The Life of Louisa Atkinson : Novelist, Journalist, Naturalist Patricia Clarke , 1990 single work biography ; Rattling the Orthodoxies : A Life of Ada Cambridge Margaret Bradstock , Louise Wakeling , 1991 single work biography
New Recognition for Early Novel Robert Hefner , 1990 single work review
— Appears in: The Canberra Times , 16 December 1990; (p. 24)

— Review of Bengala, or, Some Time Ago Mary Theresa Vidal , 1860 single work novel
A Colonial Text, Aboriginal Histories, and a Mystery... Judy Waterman , 1991 single work review
— Appears in: Antipodes , December vol. 5 no. 2 1991; (p. 164)

— Review of Bengala, or, Some Time Ago Mary Theresa Vidal , 1860 single work novel ; Crush Brenda Walker , 1991 single work novel
An Australia of the Past Rob Johnson , 1991 single work review
— Appears in: The Advertiser Magazine , 12 January 1991; (p. 10)

— Review of Bengala, or, Some Time Ago Mary Theresa Vidal , 1860 single work novel
The Marriage Market, a New Colonial Text Elizabeth Morrison , 1991 single work review
— Appears in: Overland , Autumn no. 122 1991; (p. 77-79)

— Review of Bengala, or, Some Time Ago Mary Theresa Vidal , 1860 single work novel
Untitled Paul Eggert , 1998 single work correspondence
— Appears in: Margin , April no. 44 1998; (p. 18-20)
Beyond the Wattle: Recent Perspectives on Australian Colonial Literature Michael Ackland , 1999 single work criticism
— Appears in: Bibliographical Society of Australia and New Zealand Bulletin , Second Quarter vol. 23 no. 2 1999; (p. 116-127)
Bengala or Some Time Ago [1990] : Editor's Introduction Susan McKernan , 1990 single work criticism biography
— Appears in: Bengala, or, Some Time Ago 1990; (p. xiii-xxxi)
McKernan provides biographical information and an account of the composition, publication and reception of Bengala in this introduction to her edition of the novel.
New Recognition for Early Novel Robert Hefner , 1990 single work criticism
— Appears in: The Canberra Times , 16 December 1990; (p. 24)
Two Early Novelists : Anna Maria Bunn and Mary Theresa Vidal Susan McKernan , 1988 single work criticism
— Appears in: A Bright and Fiery Troop : Australian Women Writers of the Nineteenth Century 1988; (p. 53-68)
Last amended 21 Jun 2024 16:05:08
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