AustLit logo
image of person or book cover 7871085619854277298.jpg
Image courtesy of publisher's website.
Issue Details: First known date: 2014... 2014 The Bilingual Cockatoo : Writing Italian Australian Lives
The material on this page is available to AustLit subscribers. If you are a subscriber or are from a subscribing organisation, please log in to gain full access. To explore options for subscribing to this unique teaching, research, and publishing resource for Australian culture and storytelling, please contact us or find out more.

AbstractHistoryArchive Description

This book is a study of biographies and autobiographies of Italian Australians. It looks at full-length life-writing texts, including accounts of the Italian Australian experience of war-time internment, success stories, narratives of trauma and grievance and life narratives as a form of ethnography. There is a variable zoom focus, ranging from a whole chapter devoted to a single text, to surveys of a dozen or more texts in each of four chapters. A final overview maps out a chronology and typology of Italian Australian life writing relating it to immigrant life writing generally. [from Trove]

Notes

  • Dedication: This book is dedicated to all those who have come from Italy to make a new home in Australia.
  • The bilingual cockatoo of the title is from Amelia: A Long Journey. Gatt-Rutter explains that Amelia Musso Tilbury's household in Melbourne had a cockatoo named Bello with 'a considerable repertoire in Italian and English, as well as at least two dogs' voices, all of which he addressed to the appropriate interlocutors' (29).

Contents

* Contents derived from the Ormond, Brighton - Moorabbin area, Melbourne - Inner South, Melbourne, Victoria,:Hybrid , 2014 version. Please note that other versions/publications may contain different contents. See the Publication Details.
Bello the Bilingual Cockatoo : Writing Italian Lives in Australia, John Gatt-Rutter , single work criticism (p. 1-29)
Note: A revised version of the previously published article.
'You're on the List!' Writing the Australian Italian Experience of War-Time Internment, John Gatt-Rutter , single work criticism
This paper compares the discursive and experiential valence of the two fullest autobiographical accounts of internment written by Australian Italians, that by Claudio Alcorso in The Wind You Say (1993) and that by Peter Dalseno (1994), both of whom were in Loveday from 1942 to 1944 (while Alcorso had been in Hay from June 1940). Beyond the shock of unmerited deprivation of liberty and the equally unmerited stigma of being defined as "enemy aliens", the experience of, and discourse on, internment of the two turns out very different, despite the relative closeness in age when detained. For Alcorso, a patrician from Rome, the internment experience is one of opening up to and enamourment with the world and with life - the Australian outback, working-class and other Australian Italians, human creativity - and the worst crisis comes with release. For Dalseno's alter ego, Peter Delano, raised in the Ingham area, the initial shock is worst, denying him his hard won Australian identity component, and internment represents an intensification of the sordidness of life outside, while release brings with it reacceptance into the wider Australian society. This study thus shows the diversity of ways in which a common history is experienced and discursively conveyed by individuals. [Author's abstract]
(p. 30-67)
Trauma and Grievance, John Gatt-Rutter , single work criticism (p. 68-101)
Writing the Life of an Italian Australian : Piero Genovesi's 'Sebastiano Pitruzzello : l'uomo - la famiglia - l'industria', John Gatt-Rutter , single work criticism (p. 102-112)
Note: This appears as part of Chapter 4 'Celebrating Italian Australian Lives'.
Celebrating Italian Australian Lives, John Gatt-Rutter , single work criticism (p. 102-149)
Autoethnography, John Gatt-Rutter , single work criticism (p. 150-164)
Fosco Antonio's 'My Reality' : A Rogue Italian Australian Autobiography, John Gatt-Rutter , single work criticism (p. 165-185)
Overview, John Gatt-Rutter , single work criticism (p. 186-209)

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • Ormond, Brighton - Moorabbin area, Melbourne - Inner South, Melbourne, Victoria,: Hybrid , 2014 .
      image of person or book cover 7871085619854277298.jpg
      Image courtesy of publisher's website.
      Extent: viii, 237p.p.
      Note/s:
      • Published April 2014
      ISBN: 9781925000269 (paperback) :

Other Formats

  • Also large print.

Works about this Work

Untitled Natalie Edwards , 2015 single work review
— Appears in: Life Writing , vol. 12 no. 2 2015; (p. 233-237)

— Review of The Bilingual Cockatoo : Writing Italian Australian Lives John Gatt-Rutter , 2014 multi chapter work criticism
[Review] The Bilingual Cockatoo : Writing Italian Australian Lives Simone Battiston , 2015 single work review
— Appears in: Journal of Australian Studies , July vol. 39 no. 2 2015; (p. 284-285)

— Review of The Bilingual Cockatoo : Writing Italian Australian Lives John Gatt-Rutter , 2014 multi chapter work criticism
Untitled Natalie Edwards , 2015 single work review
— Appears in: Life Writing , vol. 12 no. 2 2015; (p. 233-237)

— Review of The Bilingual Cockatoo : Writing Italian Australian Lives John Gatt-Rutter , 2014 multi chapter work criticism
[Review] The Bilingual Cockatoo : Writing Italian Australian Lives Simone Battiston , 2015 single work review
— Appears in: Journal of Australian Studies , July vol. 39 no. 2 2015; (p. 284-285)

— Review of The Bilingual Cockatoo : Writing Italian Australian Lives John Gatt-Rutter , 2014 multi chapter work criticism
Last amended 2 Nov 2015 15:36:02
X