AustLit

(Introduction)

'Periodicals of all formats provide insight into the times in which they were produced. This is especially so for long-lived periodicals with similarly long-lived editors whose influence reaches well beyond their editorial desk and into the culture they are compelled to transform. The periodicals shelves of our libraries provide a quiet space in which the long runs of Meanjin and Overland can be found in their physical form, sometimes facing each other across the aisle, or sometimes closer together in smaller libraries like mine. But this silence belies the dynamic and sometimes uncomfortable processes that preceded each issue. Through close personal connections to these processes and supported by a wealth of archival evidence, Jim Davidson’s Emperors in Lilliput brings these two magazines and their founding editors to life in vivid detail.' (Introduction)

'Overland and Meanjin, Australia’s longest-running literary journals, have already been chronicled in a depth befitting their statuses, and that of their venerable foundation editors, Stephen Murray-Smith (1922–1988) and Clem Christesen (1911–2003): Meanjin in the form of a (semi)approved history, Just City and Mirrors by Lynne Stahan, and Overland thanks in large part to the accumulated efforts of former editor John McLaren.'  (Introduction)

'A biography of two very different editors illuminates literary life in postwar Australia'

'The cover of Jim Davidson’s Emperors in Lilliput juxtaposes a photograph of Meanjin’s Clem Christesen smoking a pipe with a picture of Overland’s Stephen Murray-Smith lighting his.'