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Non-fiction review: The Best Australian Essays 2010

BestEssays2010The Best Australian Essays 2010
Robert Drewe (ed)
Black Inc.

The first task of an editor of a volume of essays is to arrive at a working definition of the form. Accepting that an essay is a ‘shortish piece of non fiction on a focused subject, often written from a personal point of view’, Robert Drewe then proceeds to declare his editorial objective:

I wanted to showcase those subjects which thoughtful and talented Australian writers were absorbed by in this particular year; indeed (I thought), wouldn't it be good to show what this country, and its culture, was about in 2010.

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Written by Boris Kelly on 27-01-2011, 6 user comments

Love your work, Childs: a review

Holly Childs' workI have come across some writing that made me think ‘I have never come across anything like this before,’ and then I thought about thinking that and the closest comparison I could come to was Richard Brautigan. But it’s not that, either. Because it’s written by a woman, is Antipodean and totally twenty-first century.

I am a sheltered sort of person in the great scheme of avant-garde literature and do not doubt that there is a great swathe of writers experimenting with language and the digital age, with stream of consciousness and pithy, well-crafted satire and with self-publishing in the professionally designed-yet-home-created zine. It is, however, this work particularly that I have, blessedly, been introduced to and, at present, is my only reference point. ... read more

Written by Clare Strahan on 24-01-2011, 3 user comments

Fiction review: Reading Madame Bovary

readingmadamebovaryReading Madame Bovary
Amanda Lohrey
Black Inc.

I was keen to read these stories by Amanda Lohrey after admiring her novella Vertigo (2008). Better known for her novels and essays, Lohrey has put together nine stories, five of them previously unpublished, for the collection Reading Madame Bovary.

Lohrey has a remarkable ability to be lyrical and profound while keeping both feet in the here and now of Australian life. For a ‘literary’ writer, she is refreshingly comfortable with the mundane minutiae of modern life (to-do lists and washing up) and, from there, teases out the themes and issues that lie beneath the surface of contemporary consciousness. ... read more

Written by Carol Middleton on 21-01-2011, 2 user comments

Theatre review: Peer Gynt

Peer Gynt | Four Larks Theatre | until Saturday 11 December

peer_gynt_fourlarkstheatre_04

On Wednesday night I was lucky enough to share with friends in the experience that is the Four Larks Theatre company. Even a visit to their website gives a sense of how this self-funded young company masters atmosphere. Entering their space is like being stolen by storybook Gypsies.

Four Larks describe themselves as ‘a collective’ and this collab

Written by Clare Strahan on 10-12-2010, 5 user comments

Fiction review: Bereft

Bereft_FNL_REV_cvr.inddBereft
Chris Womersley
Scribe

Occasionally a book so exceptional comes along that you want to greedily devour it in one sitting. Like a new lover you want to spend every moment together and become resentful when forced to part. You eat with it, curl up in bed with it, and pick it up the moment you wake. This rarely happens to me, but it did with Bereft.

Bereft is Chris Womersley’s second novel, and his first, The Low Road, won the Ned Kelly Award for Best First Fiction in 2008. If Bereft doesn’t pick up some prestigious awards I’ll be very surprised. ... read more

Written by Irma Gold on 8-12-2010, 1 user comment

Non-fiction review: Why vs Why: Nuclear Power

why vs why

Why vs Why: Nuclear Power
Prof Barry Brook & Prof Ian Lowe
Pantera Press

It isn't easy to review a book that consist of two different people arguing each side of an argument. In this case, it's about whether Australia should pursue nuclear power, but my objections would serve for any book that worked in the same way. Why vs Why: Nuclear Power is written as a flipbook; each writer argues his case for or against nuclear power, and is then rebutted by the other. You can then flip the book to hear the opposing side, and its accompanying rebuttal. ... read more

Written by Georgia Claire on 8-12-2010, 1 user comment

Non-fiction review: Unmaking War, Remaking Men

Unmaking warUnmaking War, Remaking Men
Kathleen Barry
Spinifex Press

Five years ago, walking through the Dandenong ranges outside Melbourne with my lover at the time, I had one of those fights that seem to tear the hills down around your ears. It was meant to be a beautiful afternoon, allocated ‘couple time’, but I have very little memory of the day, of what the weather was like, of the shifting undergrowth.

All I remember is the fight, which was over feminism: if it was worth it, what it meant, and who was worse done by when all the million hurts and slights of our different genders had been tallied and reckoned. ... read more

Written by Ruby J Murray on 7-12-2010, 2 user comments

Poetry review: The Bee Hut

'The Bee Hut'The Bee Hut
Dorothy Porter
Black Inc.

Whatever you think of her poetic style, Dorothy Porter was the contemporary godmother of narrative poetry in Australia. Having read and watched the Joanne Davis performance of The Monkey’s Mask, and having also thoroughly enjoyed What A Piece Of Work, I learned some important lessons about how to manipulate time and space using poetics in the writing of a verse novel. I was curious to read Porter’s collection The Bee Hut to find distinctions between the micro-narrative style that drives the plots of her novels and the standalone free verse of her other poetry. ... read more

Written by Tara Mokhtari on 16-11-2010, 3 user comments

Non-fiction review: Culture Crisis: Anthropology and Politics in Aboriginal Australia

' Culture Crisis: Anthropology and Politics in Aboriginal Australia'Culture Crisis: Anthropology and Politics in Aboriginal Australia
Jon Altman and Melinda Hinkson (eds)
UNSW Press

Labelling something to be ‘in crisis’ can be a fraught activity; when the motivation is to create a rethinking of the issue at hand, it often leads to bandaid solutions to quickly fix the crisis. In this collection of essays, Altman and Hinkson have chosen this approach – divided into four parts: the problem of recognition, the problem of violence, counting culture, imagining futures – to bring many of the discussions that have been taking place among Australian anthropologists to a wider audience. It’s a job well done. ... read more

Written by Scott Foyster on 11-11-2010, 1 user comment

Fiction review: A Book of Endings

'A book of endings'A Book of Endings
Deborah Biancotti
Twelth Planet Press

Among the deleterious effects of the separation of genre from mainstream fiction – a separation that is in many ways a marketing invention – is the marginalisation of various authors. It’s a process that affects the genre writers more than the mainstream ones. Genre is, after all, that embarrassing cousin who is placed at the far end of the dinner table next to the most understanding of relatives, who nod pleasantly, tolerating with good humour the truths we’d rather avoid and which our cousin insists on raising in a slightly too loud voice. Our cousin is always interesting, but not fit for polite, ‘civilised’ company. And yet, all too often, when the dinner comes to an end, we find that the cousin hasn’t actually said anything controversial, hasn’t offended anyone, is in fact, well, not that embarrassing after all. The whole thing was just a family myth, a misconception based on events of years before. The cousin, it appears, has matured. ... read more

Written by Rjurik Davidson on 8-11-2010, 5 user comments

Shaun Micallef and the Booker Prize

A warning first up: if this blog dissolves into nonsensical rambling, please be so kind as to quietly move on to something more substantial. (Pretty much anything on the Overland site without my name attached to it.) Because, quite frankly, this could get quite silly.

'Preincarnate'Last Wednesday night, the lovely Shearer’s bookshop in Leichhardt hosted an evening with Shaun Micallef.

‘Why on earth would they do that?’ You may ask. ‘Isn’t that the chappie off the television? What was he doing in a bookshop?’ ... read more

Written by Claire Zorn on 5-11-2010, 4 user comments

Non-fiction review: art + soul

art + soulart + soul
Hetti Perkins
Pan Macmillan

The first thing you notice about this book is that it is beautiful. The sleeve on the cover balances a contemporary Aboriginal painting across the top, with a lovely landscape shot along the bottom; standing in between is Hetti and the title.

This beauty is continued throughout the pages with ample space given to many of the artworks exhibited. The texts itself is also well laid out, spaced so as not to overcrowd the images when they share the page. All in all, it gives austere to the artworks, allowing them to speak for themselves, to flourish with words that add a history of the artists and their relationship to the art world, to Hetti, and, importantly, Hetti’s own relationship to the artworks. ... read more

Written by Scott Foyster on 1-11-2010, No comments

Dylan, the Devil and Judas

Bob DylanWhile many have searched for religious themes in Dylan’s lyrics, what has often been overlooked is the astonishing amount of times Dylan has scripturally referred to Satan. Furthermore, the unsavoury characters of Judas and Cain have also made regular appearances. Satan is usually portrayed as the great deceiver, the man of peace masquerading as an angel of light, while Judas and Cain are invariably metaphors for betrayal and guilt.

i) The Devil
Dy

Written by Damian Balassone on 29-10-2010, 5 user comments

Non-fiction review: Here on Earth

'Here on Earth' Here on Earth
Tim Flannery
Text

Flannery’s new book Here On Earth reads like a cross between Bill Bryson and Jared Diamond, which is reassuring given it has the title of a Leelee Sobieski film. It also sort of makes sense; both of these authors have read and commented on the book, and Diamond is referenced throughout. Flannery has clearly read their work and is borrowing from their styles, which I enjoyed.

The book talks a lot about the Gaia Hypothesis and essentially argues for it throughout. For those unaware, the Gaia hypothesis states that the world as a whole tends to act as a singular organism and has many feedbacks and other mechanisms to maintain a given state. I personally am not a fan. I believe the world does a lot of things we don’t understand and certainly has all sorts of negative and positive feedback models going on, but I find both the name of the hypothesis and many of the people claiming to adhere to it irritating. It’s all a bit hippy-pie-in-the-sky from where I’m sitting, and I was surprised to find Flannery advocating it. ... read more

Written by Georgia Claire on 19-10-2010, 6 user comments

Off to the Athenaeum

It was a shocking night for venturing out on Friday – rain, wind, dark (you get that at night), cold, a storm on the way. Bravely, I drove into town. After my last foray to the comedy theatre, I thought better of using public transport.

Meeting dear, generous friends in the foyer of the Athenaeum, I was excited. I’d watched some youtubes of Fear of a Brown Planet and liked them very much. I knew nothing about Allah Made Me Funny, but the title appealed.

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Written by Clare Strahan on 18-10-2010, 14 user comments