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Notes
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Dedication: To Nettie Palmer
Contents
- The Passage : Afterword, single work criticism (p. 204-207)
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Other Formats
- Also braille.
Works about this Work
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The Art of Living: Vance Palmer and Eleanor Dark on the Sunshine Coast
2017
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Queensland Review , December vol. 24 no. 2 2017; (p. 202-214)Vance Palmer's The Passage (1930) and Eleanor Dark's Lantana Lane (1959) bracket the period during which the narrow coastal strip north of Brisbane from the Pumicestone Passage to the Noosa River was being transformed economically and culturally into what we know today as the Sunshine Coast. In the 1920s and 1950s respectively, Palmer and Dark participated in changing the region, and as established writers they reflected upon that metamorphosis in literary works that reached a national audience at a time when Brisbane's near north coast was off the beaten track for professional writers. But for millennia prior to colonisation, this area had sustained a vibrant economy and culture centred on bunyas from the mountains and seafood from the coast. By the late nineteenth century, this vast economic and cultural network had been radically disrupted by the incursions of timber-getters and pastoralists, and many of the traditional owners who had survived the frontier wars had been removed. While the inscription of a new identity on the region in the twentieth century was driven by the real estate speculators who coined the name ‘Sunshine Coast’, Palmer in The Passage and Dark in Lantana Lane share a more cooperative, sustainable, egalitarian and anti-imperialist vision for the region, with some indirect and ambiguous debts to its Aboriginal past.
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From Vance Palmer's The Passage to Susan Johnson's The Landing
2017
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Queensland Review , December vol. 24 no. 2 2017; (p. 191-201)'This article compares Vance Palmer's classic novel, The Passage (1930), set in Caloundra, with Susan Johnson's The Landing (2015), a comic novel of manners set at the northern end of the contemporary Sunshine Coast. It considers the novels’ different perspectives on Australian society and changing values, including attitudes to nature, arguing that Palmer's novel now seems more idealistic than realist while Johnson's cynicism about Australian life shows some disturbing elements beneath the comedy.' (Abstract)
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Harmony, with Discord : The Christesens and the Palmers (From a Work in Progress)
2015
single work
essay
— Appears in: Meanjin , vol. 74 no. 2 2015; (p. 82-91) 'Australia's most famous literary couple in the 1940s were Vance and Nettie Palmer. Vance, a handsome man of little more than average height, usually sported a bow tie over regular blue shirts, which suited him; otherwise he dressed in neat, brown, casual clothes, which went well with his 'customary shade of mahogany'. And, answering a question that was on everyone's lips, he had served overseas - even if the Armistice had been declared in 1918 before he saw action. He had already been to Europe twice, the second time moving in the circle of A.R. Orage and the New Age. here he had rubbed shoulders with such people as Katherine Mansfield, Wyndham Lewis and Ezra Pound. More importantly, Vance had imbibed guild socialist ideas of community, craftsmanship and folk curlture, sustaining a lifelong detestation of cities, industrial society and mass culture.' (Author's introduction) -
New Issues, Old Issues : The Australian Tradition Revisited
2003
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Overland , Autumn no. 170 2003; (p. 49-56)McLaren discusses a number of Australian novels (all recently re-issued) which have been central to developing the way in which Australians and foreigners think about white society in this continent. He distinguishes several trends and traditions in describing and characterising Australia's social and political system. Whereas Clarke and Richardson present Australia as a prison, Palmer and Waten present it as a land offering the promise of freedom. Furphy, on the other hand, is seen as a writer 'who shows us a country seeming to offer plentitude but finally withholding its promise' (54).
McLaren concludes that the 'past expressed in these fictions variously produced values of solidarity, egalitarianism, harmony with the land, but their values remain circumscribed by fear of the powerless and the dispossessed, by the arrogance of the powerful, and by distrust of the outsider. Our future will be secure only as we accept continuity with the past, enter into dialogue with the differences of the present, and accept a common responsibility towards the land that supports us' (56).
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In Landscape Bound
2002
single work
review
— Appears in: Colloquy : Text Theory Critique , April no. 6 2002;
— Review of The Passage 1930 single work novel
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Reissued Realism
2002-2003
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , December-January no. 247 2002-2003; (p. 61-62)
— Review of Sugar Heaven 1936 single work novel ; Distant Land 1964 single work novel ; The Passage 1930 single work novel ; Jonah 1911 single work novel -
In Landscape Bound
2002
single work
review
— Appears in: Colloquy : Text Theory Critique , April no. 6 2002;
— Review of The Passage 1930 single work novel -
'The Passage.'
1930
single work
review
— Appears in: The Queenslander , 27 March 1930; (p. 64)
— Review of The Passage 1930 single work novel -
Untitled
1930
single work
review
— Appears in: The Bulletin , 9 April vol. 51 no. 2617 1930; (p. 8)
— Review of The Passage 1930 single work novel -
Untitled
1930
single work
review
— Appears in: The Times Literary Supplement , 16 October 1930; (p. 841)
— Review of The Passage 1930 single work novel -
New Issues, Old Issues : The Australian Tradition Revisited
2003
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Overland , Autumn no. 170 2003; (p. 49-56)McLaren discusses a number of Australian novels (all recently re-issued) which have been central to developing the way in which Australians and foreigners think about white society in this continent. He distinguishes several trends and traditions in describing and characterising Australia's social and political system. Whereas Clarke and Richardson present Australia as a prison, Palmer and Waten present it as a land offering the promise of freedom. Furphy, on the other hand, is seen as a writer 'who shows us a country seeming to offer plentitude but finally withholding its promise' (54).
McLaren concludes that the 'past expressed in these fictions variously produced values of solidarity, egalitarianism, harmony with the land, but their values remain circumscribed by fear of the powerless and the dispossessed, by the arrogance of the powerful, and by distrust of the outsider. Our future will be secure only as we accept continuity with the past, enter into dialogue with the differences of the present, and accept a common responsibility towards the land that supports us' (56).
- y Australian Literature Society Medallists Sydney : Australasian Medical Publishing , 1935 Z1040561 1935 single work criticism Summary of an address given to the Australian English Association 25th September 1935.
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Best Australian Novel
1931
single work
column
— Appears in: The Queenslander , 25 June 1931; (p. 44) A report of Palmer's being awarded the Australian Literature Society Gold Medal. - y A Guide to the Study of 'The Passage' Sydney : Jacaranda Press , 1965 Z1151210 1965 single work criticism
- y Notes on 'The Passage' Sydney : Horwitz Grahame , 1965 Z1151213 1965 single work criticism
Awards
- 1930 winner ASAL Awards — ALS Gold Medal
- 1929 winner The Bulletin Novel Competition
- Queensland,
- Coast,
- 1920s