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AbstractHistoryArchive Description
'‘I know it’s a daring suggestion, but I’ll make it anyway.’
'Charmian Clift was a writer ahead of her time. Lyrical and fearless, her essays seamlessly the personal and the political.
'In 1964, Charmian Clift and her husband George Johnston returned to Australia after living and writing for many years in the cosmopolitan community of artists on the Greek island of Hydra. Back in Sydney, Clift found her opinions were far more progressive than those of many of her fellow Australians.
'This new edition of Charmian Clift’s essays, selected and introduced by her biographer Nadia Wheatley, are drawn from the weekly newspaper column Clift wrote through the turbulent and transformative years of the 1960s. In these ‘sneaky little revolutions’, as Clift once called them, she supported the rights of women and migrants, called for social justice for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, opposed conscription and the war in Vietnam, acknowledged Australia’s role in the Asia-Pacific, fought censorship, called for an Australian film industry — and much more. In doing so, she set a new benchmark for the form of the essay in Australian literature.'
Source: Publisher's blurb.
Contents
- Coming Home, single work prose (p. 20-26)
- Social Drinking, single work prose (p. 27-33)
- Second Class Citizens, single work prose (p. 34-40)
- Youth Revisited, single work prose (p. 41-44)
- On Debits and Credits, single work prose (p. 45-49)
- On Painting Bricks White, single work prose (p. 50-54)
- On Lucky Dips, single work prose (p. 55-58)
- Christmas, single work prose (p. 59-63)
- The Joys of a City, single work prose (p. 64-67)
- The Sounds of Summer, single work prose (p. 68-72)
- The Law of The Stranger, single work prose (p. 73-77)
- The Rare Art of Inspiring Others, single work prose (p. 78-82)
- An Exile's Return, single work prose (p. 83-87)
- A Death in the Family, single work prose (p. 88-92)
- Things That Go Boomp in the Night, single work prose (p. 93-97)
- A Birthday in The Kelly Country, single work prose (p. 98-103)
- On Letting Asia In, single work essay (p. 103-107)
- On Living for Love Alone, single work prose (p. 108-111)
- Getting with the Forward-Lookers, single work prose (p. 112-116)
- Living in a Neighbourhood, single work prose (p. 117-121)
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
-
Lunch Hour Talk Nadia Wheatley on Charmian Clift
2024
single work
essay
— Appears in: Jessie Street National Women's Library Newsletter , February vol. 35 no. 1 2024; 'Nadia (pictured right) has made a study of Charmian Clift’s feminism, drawing mainly upon her essays published in The Sydney Morning Herald, articles written from 1964 to 1969 and the books she wrote about her reflections on life in Greece. Eighty of these essays have been collected in the volume titled, Sneaky Little Revolutions: Selected essays of Charmian Clift.' (Introduction) -
A Serving of Insurgency with Breakfast
2022
single work
review
— Appears in: Sydney Review of Books , August 2022;
— Review of Sneaky Little Revolutions : Selected Essays of Charmain Clift 2022 selected work essay
-
A Serving of Insurgency with Breakfast
2022
single work
review
— Appears in: Sydney Review of Books , August 2022;
— Review of Sneaky Little Revolutions : Selected Essays of Charmain Clift 2022 selected work essay -
Lunch Hour Talk Nadia Wheatley on Charmian Clift
2024
single work
essay
— Appears in: Jessie Street National Women's Library Newsletter , February vol. 35 no. 1 2024; 'Nadia (pictured right) has made a study of Charmian Clift’s feminism, drawing mainly upon her essays published in The Sydney Morning Herald, articles written from 1964 to 1969 and the books she wrote about her reflections on life in Greece. Eighty of these essays have been collected in the volume titled, Sneaky Little Revolutions: Selected essays of Charmian Clift.' (Introduction)