AustLit
Latest Issues
Notes
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Only literary material about Australian authors/literature individually indexed. Other material in this issue includes:
– Parodic manoeuvres and differentials in Janet Frame’s The Carpathians by Dominique Hecq
- Narrate or describe? by Aasish Kaul
- Royal ambitions: Creative writing and the Secret Rules of Courtship in the Medical Humanities by James Bradley and Susan Bradley Smith
- Strings by Timia Breederveld
Contents
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Writer-as-Narrator : Engaging the Debate around the (Un)reliable Narrator in Memoir and the Personal Essay,
single work
criticism
'Subjective and personal forms of nonfiction writing are enjoying exponential popularity in English language publishing currently, as an interested public engages with ‘true’ stories of society and culture. Yet a paradox exists at the centre of this form of writing. As readers, we want to know who the writer is and what she has to tell us. Yet as writers we use a persona, a constructed character, a narrator who is only partially the writer, to deliver the narrative. How is a writer able to convey ‘true’ stories that are inherently reliant on memory, within a constructed narrative persona?
'We find a ‘gap’ between the writer and the narrator/protagonist on the page, an empowered creative space in which composition occurs, facilitating a balance between the facts and lived experiences from which ‘true’ stories are crafted, and the acknowledged fallibility of human memory. While the gap between writer and writer-as-narrator provides an enabling space for creative composition, it also creates space for the perception of unreliability. The width of this gap, we argue, is crucial. Only if the gap is small, if writer and writer-as-narrator share a set of passionately held values, can the writer-as-narrator become a believable entity, satisfying the reader with the ‘truth’ of their story.' (Publication summary)
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Remarkable Analogue Constructions of the Author/illustrator : Re-imagining Textual Spaces of the Book as Object,
single work
prose
'Mark Z Danielewski states: ‘Ruler-wielding didacts have instilled in [readers] the notion that a book must start here, move along like this, and finish over there. But books don’t have to be so limited. They can intensify informational content and experience. Multiple stories can lie side by side on the page … pages can be tilted, turned upside down, even read backwards… But here’s the joke. Books have had this capacity all along… Books are remarkable constructions with enormous possibilities… But somehow the analogue powers of these wonderful bundles of paper have been forgotten’ (Danielewski 2002). Adopting Danielewski’s position, this paper is a fictocritical exploration of the practices involved in authoring/illustrating ‘Truth Is’, a composite illustrated novel about the multiple narratives/truths splintering from one act of heinous violence. Part murder-mystery, part pseudo-documentary, part graphic novel, ‘Truth Is’ seeks to re-imagine the textual spaces of the ‘book as object’ as a method of enriching the narrative’s thematic explorations. This paper explores the illustrated novels of Jonathan Safran Foer and others researched while creating the novel, and enmeshes this with an exploration of the author/illustrator’s intentions and trepidations in encountering the potential of the book as object.' (Publication abstract)
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Giving Solidity to Pure Wind : Temporising as Transformation,
single work
criticism
'Jared Diamond asked the acclaimed evolutionary biologist Ernst Mayr (1904-2005) why Aristotle didn’t come up with the theory of evolution. Mayr’s answer was ‘Frage stellen’ which Diamond translates as ‘a way of asking questions [sic]’ (Byrne 2013). The idea that a particular way-of-asking might generate a particular way-of-knowing and, indeed, a particular branch-of-knowledge, is utterly intriguing, especially when we frame the practice of creative writing in those terms: as a way of asking questions.
'Drusilla Modjeska unpacks the concept of ‘temporising’ in her article ‘Writing Poppy’ (Modjeska 2002: 75). This discussion invites us to consider the generative capabilities of the temporising space – as an imaginative space for writers, as an alternate way of asking questions … of seeing, being, knowing.
In narrative, the questions that underpin the work do not necessarily appear in the surface-content of the text. In this way, the story is a metaphorical representation of the questions that lie beneath. As Aristotle suggests, metaphor relies on ‘an intuitive perception of the similarity [to homoion theorein] in dissimilars’ (Ricoeur 1977: 23). In narrative we contemplate a question, or an idea, within the context of a metaphorical other. This is a form of temporising: of ‘slip[ping] into other time frames’ as a means of ‘retreat[ing] and consider[ing]’ (Modjeska 2002: 75, 76). In narrative time, we consider one thing through an alternate temporal lens. We prevaricate in otherness.
'Fiction-making represents a very particular way of asking questions. With reference to the process of writing the short story – ‘Everything that matters is silvery white’ – it is clear that ‘making’ narrative is a way of asking questions that is assisted by the transformative temporising space.' (Publication abstract)
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‘Not All Gumnuts and Outback’ : Exploring the Attitudes of Creative Writing Students Towards Australian Literature,
single work
criticism
'In Australia, laments for the dearth of Australian literature in both secondary school and university contexts have frequently surfaced in public debate, yet there has been less attention paid to student perspectives. This article discusses a small–scale survey undertaken with creative writing students enrolled in Contemporary Australian Writing at RMIT University to capture their views about Australian literature. The results of this survey indicate that a hybrid approach based on techniques derived from both creative writing and literary studies appears to have a positive effect on the attitudes of students towards Australian literature.' (Publication abstract)
- Raven Medicine, single work prose
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Are You There? Can You Forgive Me?,
single work
review
— Review of The World to Come 2014 anthology short story ; -
‘She Had Her Plants’,
single work
review
— Review of Harriet Chandler 2005 single work novella ; -
A Poet’s Place and Time,
single work
review
— Review of Opening the Windows to Catch the Sea Breeze : Selected Poems 1983 - 2011 2014 selected work poetry ; -
A Cloud into the Rainbow,
single work
review
— Review of Stretchmarks of Sun : Autofictional Fragments 2014 selected work poetry ; -
Up-hill All the Way?,
single work
review
— Review of Beds for All Who Come 2014 selected work poetry ; -
A Poetics of Attentiveness,
single work
review
— Review of Kin 2014 selected work poetry ; -
Verse Novel Offers New Way to See,
single work
review
— Review of Every Time You Close Your Eyes 2014 selected work poetry ; -
Navel Gazing in the Eighties,
single work
review
— Review of Love and Derangement 2014 single work novel ; -
Flying Close to the Sun,
single work
review
— Review of South in the World 2014 selected work poetry ; -
The Work of Surrender,
single work
review
— Review of The Yellow Emperor : A Mythography in Verse 2014 selected work poetry ;