Review of The Pathos of Distance, The Visitable Past: Images of Europe in Anglo-Australian Literature, Eagle and Emu: German-Australian Writing 1930-1990, An Antipodean Connection: Australian Writers, Artists and Travellers in Tuscany

Abstract

Whatever else might be said about them, the last ten years have been a stimulating time in the study of Australian writing, nowhere perhaps more than in the tracing of the various patterns and connections in Australian culture. Chinese, Turkish, Greek, Hungarian are only a few such studies that have appeared in book form in recent years, but probably the most assiduous and concentrated attention has been reserved for the German connection. Three of the books under notice here are merely the latest additions to a growing line; two of them appear as Volumes 6 and 7 in the now well-established German-Australian Studies Series edited in Australia by Manfred Jurgensen but published in Europe. At a time when much of the focus in Australian cultural and literary studies has moved towards women's and Aboriginal writing these books deal with the changing relationship of various Australian writers to Europe.