Reading Australia

HANNIE RAYSON’S WELL-loved Hotel Sorrento, which premiered onstage in 1991 and was made into a feature film in 1995, explored some immediately identifiable terrain for many audiences when it first appeared. It tapped the theme of Australian ‘cultural cringe’, the contested ownership of cultural and personal stories and conflict over entitlement and betrayal. These concerns…

IN OCTOBER 1945, just three months after Japan’s surrender ended Australia’s role in the Second World War, the Sydney Morning Herald announced that it had set aside £30,000 to stimulate the development of our art and literature, which included a £2,000 prize for best novel. Ruth Park recounts in the second volume of her autobiography,…

A SHORT WAY into Tell Me I’m Here, Anne Deveson’s magnificent account of her young adult son Jonathan’s catastrophic mental illness, she describes yet one more struggle to get Jonathan to agree to go to hospital. Her needs – like her assessment of his needs – are clear: he should be kept safe there for…