AustLit

'A national literature implies something much more than a collection of informative books about a land and its people. It must reflect the spirit of the land, of the people ; it must interpret and illuminate facts. It requires the activity of the creative imagination and the power to give artistic form to its creations. None the less, it would be foolish to ignore the importance of factual writings, especially in the beginnings of a separate community which, one hopes, will achieve an individual character and an individual expression in literature and in all the arts. Without the story, the history, the legend, the tale of a man's life, and other fact-records an artistic literature could not arise. ' (Introduction)