AustLit

This 'anthology of Australian poetry of the 1960s, was edited, with an introduction, by Rodney Hall and Thomas W. Shapcott. The keynote of these ‘new impulses’ was ‘a suspicion of idealism, and an inbred awareness of the consequences of totalitarian beliefs’. Authoritarianism in religion and politics was eschewed, as was the concept of national and international aggression. Major established poets such as Kenneth Slessor, Judith Wright and A. D. Hope are not represented because the editors felt that their poetry of the decade added little to their already defined stances. Their contemporaries, however, Gwen Harwood and Francis Webb, are given considerable space because they are important influences on younger poets.' (Source : The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature, online edition)