AustLit's aim is to be the definitive virtual research environment and information resource for Australian literary, print, and narrative culture scholars, students, and the public.

AustLit is a non-profit collaboration between a network of researchers from Australian universities and the National Library of Australia, led by The University of Queensland (UQ). Our goal is to support research in and the teaching of Australian literary, narrative, and print cultures. This site provides authoritative information on creative and critical works by and relating to Australian writers, relevant cultural organisations, and industries.

AustLit collaborators form a powerful coalition of senior literary researchers, librarians, and information-management professionals. Members of this group define AustLit's direction and orientation. In fulfilling its role as an element of the national research infrastructure, AustLit supports the activities of researchers working across a broad range of Australian literary and narrative cultures, book history, and print culture. AustLit makes available bibliographic and production information for works of fiction and poetry, writing for the theatre, biographical and travel writing, writing for film and television, criticism and reviews and the people and organisations who produce them.

- 740,526 works
- 132,553 agents
- 29,598 subjects

AustLit team members work at all of our partner universities creating content and indexing current publications to ensure that our data is as diverse and up-to-date as possible.

PLEASE NOTE: The use of the term 'agent' on this site is a database convention used to distinguish people and organisations from 'works'.

AustLit data is produced, displayed, manipulated, and updated by expert teams of indexers, researchers, software developers, and web designers working at all of our partner universities. Input is currently maintained at an average of more than six hundred works added to the database every week. Publication dates range from de Foigny's utopian imaginary La Terre Australe Connue (1676) to current pre-publication records. The BlackWords team are contextualising that timeline with the addition of ancient stories and songs. Research Communities contribute enhanced information, creating a rich and diverse information resource.

We interact closely with our academic colleagues through the growing number of Research Communities supported by AustLit. These are created from projects undertaken by scholars around the country. The quarterly AustLit News and an information request service also assist to keep our users up to date.

The AustLit Research & Publications Team under the directorship of Kerry Kilner welcomes approaches from scholars and other users to discuss projects that might form new Research Communities or contribute to existing ones. Our capacity for interaction is being enhanced by such projects as Aus-e-Lit and Teaching Aust. Lit.

The Current Indexing Team, under the management of Carol Hetherington at UQ Library, is responsible for maintaining an up-to-date record of relevant publications. This team also participates in ARC funded bibliographical projects, such as the periodical indexing project (2009-2011), and general quality control.

AustLit is positioned at the forefront of a developing Digital Humanities culture. While maintaining a reputation as a world-class information resource, AustLit will seek to expand its role as a research environment by providing means for greater interactivity with and between communities of researchers, teachers, students, and the wider public. AustLit aims to remain pro-actively engaged with innovative applications of technologies in information management and knowledge creation.

AustLit is currently a subscription service freely available through subscribing libraries. Access is available to registered users of the National Library of Australia, Australian State Libraries and the Northern Territory Library and remotely to registered users of the National Library of Australia, some Australian State libraries and the Northern Territory Library. Check with your library to find out how to access AustLit or email us for guest access. AustLit is also freely available to staff and students of all Australian Schools. See our Access AustLit page for more details.

AustLit is grateful for the generous support of the Australian Research Council (ARC) and the university partners who have contributed substantially to its development. The consortium of collaborating universities has received large grants under the ARC's Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment and Facilities (LIEF) scheme. Current indexing is supported by subscription income administered by the UQ Library. Subscription income is fully reinvested in AustLit content and service delivery.

The ARC continues to acknowledge AustLit's primary place in the scholarly engagement with Australian story-making by funding partner research projects such as the Children's Literature Digital Resources Project.

Other individual projects such as BlackWords, the forthcoming Australian Film and Television Resource, Australian Popular Medievalism, and Writing the Tropical North have also been supported through internal university grants and through the ARC's Discovery grants.