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AbstractHistoryArchive Description
'Tom Loxley is holed up in a remote bush shack trying to finish his book on Henry James when his beloved dog goes missing. What follows is a triumph of storytelling, as The Lost Dog loops back and forth in time to take the reader on a spellbinding journey into worlds far removed from the present tragedy.
'Set in present-day [2007] Australia and mid-twentieth century India, here is a haunting, layered work that brilliantly counterpoints new cityscapes and their inhabitants with the untamed, ancient continent beyond. With its atmosphere of menace and an acute sense of the unexplained in any story, it illuminates the collision of the wild and the civilised, modernity and the past, home and exile.' (Publisher's blurb)
Notes
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Dedication: For Gus, of course
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Epigraph: The whole of anything can never be told.- Henry James, Notebook.
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Other Formats
- Sound recording.
- Large print.
Works about this Work
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Absent Others : Asian-Australian Discontinuities in Michelle de Kretser's 'The Lost Dog'
2018
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Commonwealth : Essays and Studies , Autumn vol. 41 no. 1 2018; (p. 43-52)'This article relies on the tropes of trauma and gothic haunting to examine Michelle de Kretser's 'The Lost Dog' (2007), in which the protagonist's discarded Indianness allegorically parallels Australia's unwillingness to confront the ghosts of its past. As the novel and its critique of settler culture seem to suggest, the Australian nation should arguably develop alternative cultural paradigms that seek to accommodate both otherness and the most unwelcome aspects of its history, instead of repressing them.' (Publication abstract)
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y
The Mabo Turn in Australian Fiction
Oxford
:
Peter Lang
,
2017
13852561
2017
multi chapter work
criticism
'This is the first in-depth, broad-based study of the impact of the Australian High Court’s landmark Mabo decision of 1992 on Australian fiction. More than any other event in Australia’s legal, political and cultural history, the Mabo judgement – which recognised indigenous Australians’ customary native title to land – challenged previous ways of thinking about land and space, settlement and belonging, race and relationships, and nation and history, both historically and contemporaneously. While Mabo’s impact on history, law, politics and film has been the focus of scholarly attention, the study of its influence on literature has been sporadic and largely limited to examinations of non-Aboriginal novels.
'Now, a quarter of a century after Mabo, this book takes a closer look at nineteen contemporary novels – including works by David Malouf, Alex Miller, Kate Grenville, Thea Astley, Tim Winton, Michelle de Kretser, Richard Flanagan, Alexis Wright and Kim Scott – in order to define and describe Australia’s literary imaginary as it reflects and articulates post-Mabo discourse today. Indeed, literature’s substantial engagement with Mabo’s cultural legacy – the acknowledgement of indigenous people’s presence in the land, in history, and in public affairs, as opposed to their absence – demands a re-writing of literary history to account for a “Mabo turn” in Australian fiction. ' (Publication summary)
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The Dog and the Chameleon Poet
2013
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Captured : The Animal within Culture 2013; (p. 131-151) -
There Goes the Neighbourhood! : The Indian-Subcontinental in the Asian / Australian Literary Precinct
2012
single work
criticism
— Appears in: JASAL , vol. 12 no. 2 2012; This paper intervenes in the ongoing debate about the nature of Asian Australian Writing, a debate that started sometime circa 2000s and seems to have gathered some force with the putative rise of global Asia. In its early stages, the referent for this academic debate was Asian-American Studies and whether or not it made sense for such a trans-Atlantic term to be applied to the Antipodean region. In the last decade, Australia’s position within the Asian geo-political region has been increasingly articulated with respect to bilateral exchange with its immediate neighbours, mainly in the arena of trade and security. Writing this essay in 2012, it seems that the two strands, the academic and the geographical, have strategically merged to define the parametres of Asian Australian Writing. [First paragraph of the article] -
Melbourne by the Book
2012
single work
column
— Appears in: The Sunday Age , 12 August 2012; (p. 8-9)
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[Review] The Lost Dog
2007
single work
review
— Appears in: Bookseller + Publisher Magazine , September vol. 87 no. 3 2007; (p. 38)
— Review of The Lost Dog 2007 single work novel -
The Right Sort of People Behaving Badly
2007
single work
review
— Appears in: The Australian Literary Review , November vol. 2 no. 10 2007; (p. 6-7)
— Review of Jamaica : A Novel 2007 single work novel ; The Trout Opera 2007 single work novel ; The Lost Dog 2007 single work novel -
Alienated in Triplicate
2007
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , November no. 296 2007; (p. 47)
— Review of The Lost Dog 2007 single work novel -
Pick of the Week
2007
single work
review
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 17-18 November 2007; (p. 34)
— Review of The Lost Dog 2007 single work novel -
The Getting of Un-Wisdom
2007
single work
review
— Appears in: The Age , 17 November 2007; (p. 26-27)
— Review of The Lost Dog 2007 single work novel -
My Life and a Dog
2007
single work
column
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 24-25 November 2007; (p. 28-29) -
Plaudits Bring Less Confidence
2008
single work
column
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 8-9 March 2008; (p. 6) -
In Search of Missing Links
2008
single work
column
— Appears in: The Canberra Times , 24 May 2008; (p. 15) -
Covering the Story
2008
single work
column
— Appears in: Meanjin , vol. 67 no. 2 2008; (p. 28-34) -
The Overflow
2008
single work
column
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 12-13 July 2008; (p. 9)A column canvassing current literary news including a brief report about the judging of the Prime Minister's Literary Prize and a comment about the favourable response by a British writer to Michelle de Kretser's novel The Lost Dog.
Awards
- 2009 longlisted Women's Prize Trust Awards — Women's Prize for Fiction (UK)
- 2008 shortlisted Australia-Asia Literary Award
- 2008 shortlisted Victorian Premier's Literary Awards — Prize for Fiction
- 2008 longlisted The Booker Prize
- 2008 winner ASAL Awards — ALS Gold Medal
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cAustralia,c
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cIndia,cSouth Asia, South and East Asia, Asia,
- 1900-1999
- 2000s