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AbstractHistoryArchive Description
Argues that analysis of Australian poetic modernism in the 1940s has centred too much on the Ern Malley hoax. The essay attempts to redress this imbalance of attention in the history of Australian modernism, through a discussion of Webb's first major work.
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
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The Immortal Malley and the End of Modernity
2010
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Cordite Poetry Review , December vol. 34 no. 2010; 'An antipodean manifestation of the anti-modern tradition “Remember, this is the country of the duck-billed platypus. When you are cut off from the world, things are bound to develop in interesting ways.” With these words Peter Carey’s character in My Life as a Fake identifies the fundamental factor behind the bizarre aftermath of a literary hoax, namely: particularity of setting. Just as Bob McCorkle, fraudulent creation of Christopher Chubb, comes to life in Carey’s novel to wreak havoc and anguish upon his creator, so too did Ern Malley step out of the imagination of James McAuley and Harold Stewart into Australia of the 1940s, to forge his own place as an almost-person in the history of Australian literature.'
-
The Immortal Malley and the End of Modernity
2010
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Cordite Poetry Review , December vol. 34 no. 2010; 'An antipodean manifestation of the anti-modern tradition “Remember, this is the country of the duck-billed platypus. When you are cut off from the world, things are bound to develop in interesting ways.” With these words Peter Carey’s character in My Life as a Fake identifies the fundamental factor behind the bizarre aftermath of a literary hoax, namely: particularity of setting. Just as Bob McCorkle, fraudulent creation of Christopher Chubb, comes to life in Carey’s novel to wreak havoc and anguish upon his creator, so too did Ern Malley step out of the imagination of James McAuley and Harold Stewart into Australia of the 1940s, to forge his own place as an almost-person in the history of Australian literature.'
Last amended 11 Sep 2001 15:01:16
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Francis Webb's White Swan of Trespass : A Drum for Ben Boyd and Australian Modernism in the 1940s
The Journal of Commonwealth Literature
The Journal of Commonwealth Literature
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