AustLit

Brennan identifies an oblique reference made in Birds of Passage to a poem by Su Tung Po, a poet-painter exiled to South China at the end of the eleventh century. She aligns this with a previous reference in Castro's book to comment from historian Geoffrey Blainey on the abuse directed towards the Chinese on the goldfields in nineteenth-century Australia, making the point that 'Castro offers us the opportunity to contemplate how ancient Chinese poetry might converse with contemporary Australian writing and culture' (p. 31).

Brennan argues that while 'Castro's writing has always engaged obliquely with ethical concerns' there is a sense through the characters and dialogue of The Garden Book 'that the narrative, while remaining true to more abstract questions of writing, memory, desire and death, wants us to think deeply and urgently about the consequences of the politics of fear currently operating in Australia'.