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'Remember when I was coming back from the Antarctic on that orange icebreaker, and a friend told me that he could smell home - Tassie. I told him that The Island just makes me feel so bloody sad and it rips up my insides and it's not my home. He looked at me for a while and then said, 'Tasmania's not like that at all. What you need is a welcome to country.'
'These lines are from a letter by author Favel Parrett. She's referring to the moment of return to Hobart from a journey made possible by the Australian Antarctic Arts Fellowship - she'd been researching the novel which would become When the Night Comes. The question of why a Tasmanian would feel this way about her home state is answered by the pages that follow, though the fact that the letter is addressed to Truganini - famously and erroneously considered the last Indigenous Tasmanian, who died in Hobart in 1876 - is explanation enough.' (Editorial Introduction)
Notes
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Contents indexed selectively.
Contents
- The Married Man, extract novel (p. 17-19)
- Eggsi"He took two eggs from her hands and broke them carefully", single work poetry (p. 20)
- Crows, Callingi"Sometimes, I hear the sound of their flying,", single work poetry (p. 21)
- Flying Foxes, Wingham Brushi"Some of the bats are elbowing their way", single work poetry (p. 22)
- Fogbow, Scotlandi"Nothing looks more full of sorrow", single work poetry (p. 23)
- The Gearingi"When the riding boy fell hard,", single work poetry (p. 24-25)
-
Learning to See,
single work
prose
(p. 26-31)
'Tegan Bennett Daylight on the sensual detail of life.
- Poems from Another Planet, single work short story (p. 32-35)
-
Poets and Painters - Celebrating the Big Punchbowl,
single work
essay
(p. 36-41)
'Delia Nicholls introduces a unique collaboration in which nine pairs of poets and painters respond to the landscape and each other, connecting art and conservation.'
- Overflowi"At the edge is damp earth,", single work poetry (p. 42-43)
- Sedgeland Nationi"if we are straws slurping", single work poetry (p. 44-45)
- Toward Lighti"I whisper something to you", single work poetry (p. 46-47)
- Wonderi"The failed money-fix of the 1980s:", single work poetry (p. 48)
- Stone of Returni"A drop of spittle", single work poetry (p. 49)
- Corrango, single work short story (p. 50-56)
-
The Past Is Never Dead; It Isn't Even Past,
extract
prose
(p. 72-81)
Editor's note: In this extract from her manuscript Lessons in Landscape, former Island editor Cassandra Pybus walks in the steps of the forebears of her fifth-generation Tasmanian family through the land of Truganini.'
-
Hey Truganini,
single work
prose
(p. 82-84)
A letter to Truganini from Favel Parrett. This letter was part of the Women of Letters session at the 2015 Tasmanian Writers and Readers Festival.
- Bronze with Two Earsi"In the black-water light of the ceramics exhibit-", single work poetry (p. 85)
- Shimla Is a City Full of Ghostsi"The horizon : slice of white fish belly.", single work poetry (p. 86)
- This Is What You Have Done for Mei"This is what I would do, as the sun sheathes itself in a bank of clouds", single work poetry (p. 87)
