Published 1 June 201016 June 2010 · Main Posts Overland extract – Cate Kennedy is ‘Driven to distraction’ admin In Overland 199, Cate Kennedy examines how the constant stimulus of the internet is affecting our writing lives: I seem to have reached an impasse with the great majority of my friends, relatives, colleagues and associates – a point that sees us veering steadily in two diametrically opposed directions. The source of our dissension is the internet. They feel I’m forfeiting my opportunity for vastly improved connectedness by avoiding Facebook, Twitter and the blogosphere; I feel I’m preserving it. They tell me I’m left behind and out of the loop by my choice to shun online social networking; I’m flat out struggling to maintain offline social networking. They believe I’m passing up chances for establishing an online profile; I want nothing to do with an identity curated primarily for self-promotion and stoked with compulsive self-reportage. They tell me I sound like a cranky old Luddite. The blogosphere, they explain eagerly, is like a vast salon, full of voices and ideas keen for your attention, full of musings on books, films and public events, full of passionately held opinions and lively discussion – exactly what a writer needs. They make it sound like Paris in the 1920s – a creative ferment, testing my capacity to keep up. But the closer I look, the harder I find this to swallow. It’s gradually come to seem, instead, that the last thing a writer needs is the clamouring, 24/7, caffeinated babble-fest that now beckons so seductively from the glowing screen. Don’t get me wrong – I love the internet. Access to such a rich store of information is a marvel; wandering idly among this inconceivably massive repository, a dizzying pleasure. I confess I still visualise it as an enormous library or filing cabinet that I can go to when I need information about anything from stonemasonry to statistics. But, in its current incarnation, the net demands more of its users. You’re now expected to socialise; to upload your photos and impressions; to keep a diary for the whole world to read; to interact and respond to other users. Read the rest of Cate’s essay, ‘Driven to distraction’. admin More by admin Overland is a not-for-profit magazine with a proud history of supporting writers, and publishing ideas and voices often excluded from other places. If you like this piece, or support Overland’s work in general, please subscribe or donate. Related articles & Essays First published in Overland Issue 228 25 May 202326 May 2023 · Main Posts The ‘Chinese question’ and colonial capitalism in New Gold Mountain Christy Tan SBS’s New Gold Mountain sets out to recover the history of the Gold Rush from the marginalised perspective of Chinese settlers but instead reinforces the erasure of Indigenous sovereignty. Although celebrated for its multilingual script and diverse representation, the mini-TV series ignores how the settlement of Chinese migrants and their recruitment into colonial capitalism consolidates the ongoing displacement of First Nations peoples. First published in Overland Issue 228 15 February 202322 February 2023 · Main Posts Self-translation and bilingual writing as a transnational writer in the age of machine translation Ouyang Yu To cut a long story short, it all boils down to the need to go as far away from oneself as possible before one realizes another need to come back to reclaim what has been lost in the process while tying the knot of the opposite ends and merging them into a new transformation.
