Andrew Bolt’s disappointment

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  • Published 20120605
  • ISBN: 9781921922534
  • Extent: 264 pp
  • Paperback (234 x 153mm), eBook

MY FRIENDS TAKE a breath, lean across the table and assume the tone of Richard Dawkins explaining dinosaurs to intelligently designed Christians. They believe that in my promotion of Aboriginal achievement I’m simply being loyal to family or wanting to take a belligerent stance on our country’s identity and history.

Houses, crops, agriculture, sewing! Their frustration is benign, their love for me is no less, but they think I’ve gone too far this time. Writers are supposed to be mad and they are to be coddled for it like a warped aunty. They are also supposed to be heretical but they are not supposed to defy everything we were taught about Aborigines. They must not be encouraged to refute the national story.

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GR OnlineWhen Europeans first invaded Australia, it was common for them to comment on the verdant grasslands and gardens of the country. Few acknowledged – and most probably couldn’t conceive – that these features had been created by Aboriginal agricultural methods. Many of them, however, noticed the sudden deterioration in the colonial landscape and its soils after their arrival.

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