'In his essay ‘The Fiction Fields of Australia’ (1856), Frederick Sinnett conducts an inquiry ‘into the feasibility of writing Australian novels; or, to use other words, into the suitability of Australian life and scenery for the novel writers’ purpose and, secondly, into the right manner of their treatment’. The problem, as Sinnett identifies it – and he was not the first and certainly not the last to conjure with it – was that Australia had no lore, no tradition, no myths and legends, in short, no rich past for a writer to call upon. Apart from what he terms ‘the Aboriginal market’ and its ‘associations’, which he passes quickly over, there is ‘to be obtained in Australia not a single local reference [that is even] a century old’. With tongue firmly in cheek, Sinnett nails down the case.' (Introduction)