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1 - Models of Poet and Nation

from Part I - Change and Renewal

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 June 2024

By
Philip Mead
Edited by
Ann Vickery
Ann Vickery
Affiliation:
Deakin University, Victoria
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Summary

This chapter considers how understandings of poet and nation in Australia are divided between the settler institutions of literature and poetry and Indigenous traditions. For white Australia, nation functions as a mythic and political collective, while for First Nations people, it is an alien, oppressive framework that ignores sovereignty and is of short historical duration. The chapter considers how colonial and early Federation poets conceived of Australia as a nation in relation to the global North while post-Federation poets like A. D. Hope and Ania Walwicz identify and critique a national consciousness from quite different standpoints. The chapter includes an analysis of a proposed poetic preamble to the Australian Constitution that was defeated by referendum, along with a move to become a republic. The chapter outlines the recognition of Indigenous land rights through the Mabo decision (1992) and its impact on literature. Lastly, it considers how contemporary Aboriginal writer Evelyn Araluen satirically rejects ongoing national mythologies in her recent work, Dropbear (2021).

Keywords

nationsettler colonialismAboriginal sovereigntypoet
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Companion to Australian Poetry , pp. 21 - 37
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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References

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