Griffith Review, Re-imagining Australia

The Age

Saturday March 8, 2008

Reviewer, Thuy On

Griffith Review, Re-imagining Australia

Ed., Julianne Schultz Griffith University.

ABC Books $19.95

FOR THOSE UNFAMILIAR with the Griffith Review, it's a quarterly periodical that includes essays, reportage, memoir, fiction, poetry and artwork, with each edition dedicated to contemporary themes. The February issue is particularly pertinent given the nation has elected a new federal government. Editor Julianne Schultz has asked her 22 contributors to draw lessons from the past in order to re-imagine a future Australia.

Legal scholar George Williams starts off quite boldly, stating that Australia's system of government needs renovation, Peter Beattie argues that it's time for a National Constitutional Convention to define the roles of both the Commonwealth and the states and Peter Cochrane muses whether scholarship on Australian history can be written to interest the general public.

Elsewhere, Bruce Elder explores Henry Lawson's realistic and unforgiving writings on the bush as opposed to compatriot Banjo Paterson's more rosy images, and James Woodford suggests it makes ecological sense to put kangaroo on the menu.

Other writers to reimagine Australia include Ien Ang, who redefines multiculturalism and on the fiction front, Phillip Edmonds gets on his soapbox. Robert Drewe reflects on belonging and sea and tree changes.

© 2008 The Age

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