Cirrus@Austlit

This publication is the programme produced to accompany the Australian Chamber Orchestra's 'Last Words' tour. The tour comprised performances of works by Brahms, Beethoven and J. S. Bach as well as the world premiere performance of 'Seven Last Words'.

The works were performed in Wollongong, Sydney, Brisbane, Canberra, Melbourne, Adelaide, Perth and again in Sydney between 5 March-21 March 2004.

'David Malouf's brilliant collection of poems begins with a memory of new love - with 'grace unasked for, urgencies that boom under the pocket of a shirt' - and ends in the intimate territory of the long-familiar where there is no need for words. This volume is marked by an astonishing breadth of intelligence and erudition, yet steps lightly among the objects of our lives and the wonder of everyday replenishments. Everywhere the poems affirm the mystical delights of music, angels and fields where 'first to gather are the starlings in unquiet flocks. Then quietly, the stars'.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'Some of the best, most significant writing produced in Australia over more than two centuries is gathered in this landmark anthology. Covering all genres - from fiction, poetry and drama to diaries, letters, essays and speeches - the anthology maps the development of one of the great literatures in English in all its energy and variety.

'The writing reflects the diverse experiences of Australians in their encounter with their extraordinary environment and with themselves. This is literature of struggle, conflict and creative survival. It is literature of lives lived at the extremes, of frontiers between cultures, of new dimensions of experience, where imagination expands.

'This rich, informative and entertaining collection charts the formation of an Australian voice that draws inventively on Indigenous words, migrant speech and slang, with a cheeky, subversive humour always to the fore. For the first time, Aboriginal writings are interleaved with other English-language writings throughout - from Bennelong's 1796 letter to the contemporary flowering of Indigenous fiction and poetry - setting up an exchange that reveals Australian history in stark new ways.

'From vivid settler accounts to haunting gothic tales, from raw protest to feisty urban satire and playful literary experiment, from passionate love poetry to moving memoir, the Macquarie PEN Anthology of Australian Literature reflects the creative eloquence of a society.

'Chosen by a team of expert editors, who have provided illuminating essays about their selections, and with more than 500 works from over 300 authors, it is an authoritative survey and a rich world of reading to be enjoyed.' (Publisher's blurb)

Allen and Unwin have a YouTube channel with a number of useful videos on the Anthology.

'This anthology...is a negotiation of many spaces. That of poets and their work, the idea of "Australia", the idea of being "represented" in a different demographic (America), personal or textual issues with anthologiser, who else is being included (though none outside myself and the publishers have knowledge of this until publication). Vitally, whoat matters is the conversations that arise from the anthology going public, and how the poets and readers deal with this community that has been organically and artificially induced.' John Kinsella (Source: backcover)