AustLit
Latest Issues
AbstractHistoryArchive Description
Contents
-
Bengala or Some Time Ago [1990] : Editor's Introduction,
single work
criticism
biography
McKernan provides biographical information and an account of the composition, publication and reception of Bengala in this introduction to her edition of the novel.
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
-
The Literary Text as Historical Artifact : The Colonial Couple in Australian Romantic Fiction by Women, 1838-1860
2018
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Lilith , no. 24 2018; (p. 38-51)'This article inverts the title of Hayden White's 1974 essay 'The Historical Text as Literary Artifact' by exploring literary texts as historical artifacts. It uses three novels published by Australian women writers in the mid-nineteenth century - Catherine Helen Spence's Clara Morison (1854), Caroline Louisa Atkinson's Gertrude the Emigrant (1857), and Mary Theresa Vidal's 'Bengala, or Some Time Ago' (1860) - 'as historical sources to explore the emotional culture of colonial Australia in regard to romantic love. Following Sarah Pinto, this article takes the romantic couple as the centre of its analysis, and asks four key questions of the novels in the corpus: What kind of people fall in love? Who do they fall in love with? What kind of love do they fall in? And how do their lives and their loves interact with the colonial Australian landscape? It finds that romantic love in these novels is dependent on romanticised similarity and shared sensibility rather than eroticised otherness. It argues that while this might not necessarily be uniquely nationally distinctive, the Australian chronotopic context means that this narrative would have strong and specific resonances with a female colonial audience.' (Publication abstract)
-
The Gothic Trail : The Guardian's Place in Australian Gothic Tradition
2018
single work
essay
— Appears in: Aurealis , no. 114 2018; (p. 41-45) -
Unsettled Status in Australian Settler Novels
2011
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Victorian Settler Narratives : Emigrants, Cosmopolitans and Returnees in Nineteenth-Century Literature 2011; (p. 23-40)'The genteel society Vidal depicts is composed primarily of former tradesmen and shabby gentry from England who have managed to increase their fortunes in Australia and aspire to gentility, along with the convict or former convict servants who work for them and serve as signs of that gentility. A key aspect of Trollope's Harry Heathcote is that, as we have seen, it includes the reconciliation of a genteel squatter with a free-selector, albeit an exceptionally gentlemanly one. The squatter novels may well have contributed to this process of presenting white Australians, especially their leaders, as positive and capable figures in the English imagination. It is thus reasonable to argue that squatter novels such as Trollope's Harry Heathcote and Vidal's Bengala were part of the cultural work of creating a united Australian gentry that in turn provided both political and moral leadership for white Australians generally.'
Source: Abstract.
-
Beyond the Wattle: Recent Perspectives on Australian Colonial Literature
1999
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Bibliographical Society of Australia and New Zealand Bulletin , Second Quarter vol. 23 no. 2 1999; (p. 116-127) -
Untitled
1998
single work
correspondence
— Appears in: Margin , April no. 44 1998; (p. 18-20)
-
Untitled
1992
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Literary Studies , May vol. 15 no. 3 1992; (p. 238-241)
— Review of Ada Cambridge : Her Life and Work 1844-1926 1991 single work biography ; Bengala, or, Some Time Ago 1860 single work novel ; Thirty Years in Australia 1903 single work autobiography ; Pioneer Writer : The Life of Louisa Atkinson : Novelist, Journalist, Naturalist 1990 single work biography ; Rattling the Orthodoxies : A Life of Ada Cambridge 1991 single work biography -
New Recognition for Early Novel
1990
single work
review
— Appears in: The Canberra Times , 16 December 1990; (p. 24)
— Review of Bengala, or, Some Time Ago 1860 single work novel -
A Colonial Text, Aboriginal Histories, and a Mystery...
1991
single work
review
— Appears in: Antipodes , December vol. 5 no. 2 1991; (p. 164)
— Review of Bengala, or, Some Time Ago 1860 single work novel ; Crush 1991 single work novel -
An Australia of the Past
1991
single work
review
— Appears in: The Advertiser Magazine , 12 January 1991; (p. 10)
— Review of Bengala, or, Some Time Ago 1860 single work novel -
The Marriage Market, a New Colonial Text
1991
single work
review
— Appears in: Overland , Autumn no. 122 1991; (p. 77-79)
— Review of Bengala, or, Some Time Ago 1860 single work novel -
Untitled
1998
single work
correspondence
— Appears in: Margin , April no. 44 1998; (p. 18-20) -
Beyond the Wattle: Recent Perspectives on Australian Colonial Literature
1999
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Bibliographical Society of Australia and New Zealand Bulletin , Second Quarter vol. 23 no. 2 1999; (p. 116-127) -
Bengala or Some Time Ago [1990] : Editor's Introduction
1990
single work
criticism
biography
— Appears in: Bengala, or, Some Time Ago 1990; (p. xiii-xxxi) McKernan provides biographical information and an account of the composition, publication and reception of Bengala in this introduction to her edition of the novel. -
New Recognition for Early Novel
1990
single work
criticism
— Appears in: The Canberra Times , 16 December 1990; (p. 24) -
Two Early Novelists : Anna Maria Bunn and Mary Theresa Vidal
1988
single work
criticism
— Appears in: A Bright and Fiery Troop : Australian Women Writers of the Nineteenth Century 1988; (p. 53-68)
- Bush,
- New South Wales,
- Bush,
- 1840s