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AbstractHistoryArchive Description
'Sydney has always been the sexiest and most gaudy of our cities. In this book, the third in a series in which leading Australian authors write about their hometowns, novelist Delia Falconer conjures up its sandstone, humidity, and jacarandas. But she goes beyond these to find a far more complex city: beautiful, violent, half-wild, and at times deeply spiritual. It is a slightly unreal place, haunted by a past that it has never quite grasped, or come to terms with. Here, in her first non-fiction book, she proves herself an adept memoirist. She twines the stories of the people that have made Sydney the twenty-first century city it is today. Mad clergymen, amateur astronomers, Indigenous weather experts, crims and victims, photographers and artists: their stories are surprising, funny, and moving.' (From the publisher's website.)
Notes
-
Epigraph:
I looked out of my window in the dark
At waves with diamond quills and combs
of light
That arched their mackerel-backs and
smacked the sand
In the moon's drench, that straight enormous
glaze,
And ships far off asleep, and Harbour-buoys
Tossing their fireballs wearily each to each,
And tried to hear your voice, but all I heard
Was a boat's whistle, and the scraping squeal,
Of seabirds' voices far away, and bells,
Five bells. Five bells coldly ringing out.
Five bells.
-from 'Five Bells' by Kenneth Slessor
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
-
Lost City : Different Expressions of Love for Sydney
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , March no. 429 2021; (p. 57-58)
— Review of Sydney 2010 single work prose'Poor old Sydney. If it isn’t being described as crass and culturally superficial, it’s being condemned for allowing developers to obliterate whatever natural beauty it ever had. Is it doomed, will it survive, and if so, what kind of city is it likely to be?' (Introduction)
-
Busy Week for Library
2012
single work
column
— Appears in: The Sun-Herald , 6 May 2012; (p. 19) -
Writing the City
Sally Heath
(interviewer),
2011
single work
interview
— Appears in: Meanjin , Spring vol. 70 no. 3 2011; (p. 179-189) 'The brief to 'write about the city you live in' has produced diverse books by five Australian writers. Another has just started to contemplate the process. The cities series was the brainchild of University of New South Wales Press, with Peter Timms' Hobart the first in the series to be published, in 2009. In 2010 Matthew Condon wrote Brisbane and Delia Falconer Sydney. Sophie Cunningham's Melbourne has just been published, and Adelaide by Kerryn Goldsworthy is due out in October. Paul Daley has just been commissioned to produce 'Canberra'. The series will continue around the country. The authors and I conducted an email conversation about the project, of which and edited version is presented here.' (p. 178)
-
The Picks of the Crop
2011
single work
column
— Appears in: The Saturday Age , 6 August 2011; (p. 26-27) The judges of the 2011 Age Book of the Year Awards comment on each of the fifteen shortlisted titles. Morag Fraser and Maria Tumarkin comment on the non-fiction titles, David McCooey on the poetry titles and Jo Case and Chris Flynn on the fiction titles. -
In the Dialectic City : "The Bumpkin Calculus of Time"
2011
single work
review
— Appears in: Antipodes , June vol. 25 no. 1 2011; (p. 105-106)
— Review of Sydney 2010 single work prose
-
Beyond the Emerald City Limits
2010
single work
review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 2-3 October 2010; (p. 22-23)
— Review of Sydney 2010 single work prose -
Florid, Intoxicating Hymn to the Harbour City
2010
single work
review
— Appears in: The Australian Literary Review , October vol. 5 no. 9 2010; (p. 15)
— Review of Sydney 2010 single work prose -
First Among Equals
2010
single work
review
— Appears in: The Canberra Times , 9 October 2010; (p. 27)
— Review of Sydney 2010 single work prose -
The Secret Life of the Emerald City
2010
single work
review
— Appears in: The Age , 6 November 2010; (p. 24)
— Review of Sydney 2010 single work prose -
'Glitz and Rot'
2010
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , November no. 326 2010; (p. 62)
— Review of Sydney 2010 single work prose -
Delia Falconer
2010
single work
biography
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 2-3 October 2010; (p. 30-31) -
A Moment of Mortal Humiliation
2010
single work
autobiography
— Appears in: Australian Author , December vol. 42 no. 3 2010; (p. 18-19) 'Your first novel marks a transition from writing for yourself to feeling the audience over your shoulder, says Delia Falconer, who weeded the vegies and played golf to maintain balance under the pressure.' (p. 18) -
The Picks of the Crop
2011
single work
column
— Appears in: The Saturday Age , 6 August 2011; (p. 26-27) The judges of the 2011 Age Book of the Year Awards comment on each of the fifteen shortlisted titles. Morag Fraser and Maria Tumarkin comment on the non-fiction titles, David McCooey on the poetry titles and Jo Case and Chris Flynn on the fiction titles. -
Writing the City
Sally Heath
(interviewer),
2011
single work
interview
— Appears in: Meanjin , Spring vol. 70 no. 3 2011; (p. 179-189) 'The brief to 'write about the city you live in' has produced diverse books by five Australian writers. Another has just started to contemplate the process. The cities series was the brainchild of University of New South Wales Press, with Peter Timms' Hobart the first in the series to be published, in 2009. In 2010 Matthew Condon wrote Brisbane and Delia Falconer Sydney. Sophie Cunningham's Melbourne has just been published, and Adelaide by Kerryn Goldsworthy is due out in October. Paul Daley has just been commissioned to produce 'Canberra'. The series will continue around the country. The authors and I conducted an email conversation about the project, of which and edited version is presented here.' (p. 178)
-
Busy Week for Library
2012
single work
column
— Appears in: The Sun-Herald , 6 May 2012; (p. 19)
Awards
- 2012 shortlisted New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards — Douglas Stewart Prize for Non-Fiction
- 2012 shortlisted National Biography Award
- 2011 shortlisted New South Wales Premier's History Prize New South Wales History Prize — New South Wales Community and Regional History Prize
- 2011 winner Mark and Evette Moran Nib Award for Literature
- 2011 co-winner 'The Nib': CAL Waverley Library Award for Literature Mark and Evette Moran Nib Award for Literature — The Alex Buzo Shortlist Prize
Last amended 14 Jan 2021 14:22:54
Subjects:
- Sydney, New South Wales,
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