Cirrus@Austlit

'As no literature can claim to be monolithic, the essays collected in this book examine the various ways in which different European literary traditions were mediated and blended through individual Australian poets into Australian literature culture. In part one the focus is thus on the new or hitherto rather neglected European literary and cultural affiliations in verse written by major Australian poets: A.D. Hope, James McAuley and Douglas Stewart. Two recent Australian verse anthologies are also examined and contemporary Aboriginal poetry in English contextualized with regard to its 'hybridization' of orality and literacy. Part two is dedicated to Slovene migrant poetry produced in Australia. It analyzes the work of two major Slovene migrant poets living in Australia, Bert Pribac and Joze Zohar.' (Publication summary)

'These selected essays on Canadian, Australian and New Zealand literatures often, although not always, consider individual texts and literary authors within the postcolonial paradigm. They discuss some of the most prominent, mostly contemporary literary authors in these genres, including, for example, Margaret Attwood, C. K. Stead, Christopher Kosh, David Malouf, Richard Flanagan, Andrew Riemer, Ouyang Yu, A. D. Hope, Teju Cole from the USA, and others. Several studies focus on significant issues in recent diasporic and transcultural writing in English, including specific Slovenian literary production, while some of the essays examine the literary representations of a country in a particular national collective consciousness.' [From the back cover]