The global reception of post-national literary fiction: the case of Gerald Murnane

This paper considers the situation of the changing global market for Australian literary fiction. In particular it uses the case of Gerld Murnane to examine ways in which these changes might be beneficial to at least some authors as we enter an era of 'post-national' literary fiction.The paper traces the international reception of Murnane's fiction and the subsequently the development of his global reputation. It incorporates Murnane's own observations (drawn from personal correspondence with the author) and suggests that although it has been argued that the impacts of globalisation will be detrimental for Australian literary fiction, there may also be some reasons for optimism

Juliana de Nooy. What’s France Got to Do with It?: Contemporary Memoirs of Australians in France.

Revie

Libraries, the Long Tail and the Future of Legacy Print Collections

Chris Anderson's concept of the 'long tail has evoked considerable interest and discussion from librarians. To date these discussions have largely accepted without question the veracity of Anderson's model and its applicability to library collections. The purpose of this article is to examine some elements of the model in order to firstly, determine if it can indeed be simply adopted for use when describing the library collecting environment; and secondly, if there is some divergence, what does this tell us about the future management of print collections

Print Serial Cancellations in University Libraries Post 1990: What do the CAUL Statistics Reveal?

Recent reports on Australia's research infrastructure have highlighted the decline in serial subscriptions in academic and research libraries during the 1990s. They have used the annual CAUL statistics in order to support these claims. This article examines the CAUL statistics for serial subscriptions, indicating their numerous flaws when used for longitudinal analysis. Alternative interpretations of the statistics are provided, which provide some evidence that rates of subscriptions to print periodicals were sustained for a longer period than previous uses of the data have suggested

Charmian Clift, Brenda Chamberlain, and the dichotomous freedom of Hydra

This essay draws a comparison between two published memoirs of participants, both of them women writers, in the Hydra expatriate community of the 1950s and ’60s: Australian Charmian Clift’s Peel Me a Lotus, and Welsh artist and writer Brenda Chamberlain’s A Rope of Vines. As memoirs of female experience on Hydra the two texts have elements in common, but the contrasts are also stark. Whereas Clift focused on family life, the bucolic harbourside agora and the boisterous life of the taverns and kafenia, Chamberlain represented herself as being alone and declared, ‘the port and the people on it do not interest me.’ For Chamberlain, the dockside was a place of ‘unreal glamour’ that deadened her creative spirit as surely as it deflected Hydra’s international visitors from understanding the true nature of the island they superficially embraced. This essay discusses both Clift’s and Chamberlain’s responses to Hydra, examining how despite the differences in their memoirs, both writers can be seen to be working at a resolution of the conflicting aspects of Hydra the town and Hydra the island, as each woman struggles in her own way to realise the promise of ‘freedom

Brendan McNamee. Grounded Visionary: The Mystic Fictions of Gerald Murnane.

Review

An Assessment of Australian Research Library Journal Cancellations, 1990-2003

This paper reports on the outcomes of research assessing the nature and extent of print journal cancellations by Australian research libraries since 1990. The cancellation activity of two groups of libraries, one representing the national and state library sector and the other the university library sector, was examined. These two groups were tested for their cancellation of both Australian and international journals. From the results some conclusions are reached about the factors driving the cancellations and the implications these cancellations might have for the nation's access to scholarly journal literature