There's a bundle of stuff on them on the Net, Ian. In fact one of them still
lives in Perth, although he is an old man now - Alec Choate. He was
published in their Anthologies ...

Here's a file I still have hanging around from some study I was doing into
Australian english. If I find more I'll send it on. (Some of the file seems
messy, but you'll just have to tidy any bits up you want or go to the
website.)

Andrew


From Rex Ingamells Unknown Land (Adelaide, 1934)

Australia's long, lone coast of capes and bays,
vast gulfs and pebbled inlets, steep arrays
of salt-ribbed seaweed,  shelly beaches,  scarred
cliff-granite, rock-jut, creamy sand-shelves, marred
of smooth perfection only by rain-runnels
or. at low tide, by tiny sea-worm tunnels . . .
Australia's long, lone coastline will preserve
an unassailable. secret soul, observe
its own communion ... into which will enter
no whisper of strange empires where they centre:
Australia will rebut a hundred races
if such envision only alien places
as source of truth . . .



collected from http://www.reasoninrevolt.net.au/pdf/b000071.pdf 24 November
2005

1V: NEW THOLIGHTS FOR OLD.
A new culture must be possessed of a new idiom. The
thought-forms of the past are no longer applicable, and a new
language must arise to fill the void. The uew literature must
reflect the song of galahs at nightfall, catch the rhyth~ri of
sun-filled rocks, echo the quiet sound of billabongs at night.
jt ~nust capture that spirit t h r o q h which
"The barest hills in arid sand
burn beauty into sight
when evening, with a savage hand.
sets a11 their scarps dight."
It is not enough merely to think ot gumtrees; the thoughtidmm
through which we convey our pictures must he adapted
to them. Cattle tracks are no longer "long dusky aisles." 111
I I I C plxe of such Gothic visions arise pictures of
"Stern-hearted freemen, felling tall trees,
building
rough homesteads amid far, unfamiliar places."
rugged pictures of hard days that fade into other pictures OF
"klerds of cattle, lowing by the fertile hanks of
eastcrn rivers; drowsing under redgums, where the blackand-
whitt. magpie sits calling ecstatically."
The Australian poet must cry with Mudie:
"Let us, oh sun, take fire
from your bright heat, let bushfires rage
about the scrub and ranges of our hearts."
He must paint the truly Australian in a way that is itself trdy
reflective of the scene it paints. He must learn, as R. Kate
learnt in The Waratah. to express himself through his ageless
0 traditions:
"How many dawns and sunset came
Across the valley of the years
Before your heart of sculptured flame
Blazed through its galaxy of spears?
Green spears that lift with one desire '
To shield your heart of chiselled fire!"
IHis verse forms must probe the dim caverns of the Nullarbor,
must wander through the mid-day quiet of the b ~ h a,n d
reflect triumphantly the electric colour of sundown burning
on the purple hills. His song of liyht must be a sun-corroboree,
his song of night a painting of the quiet of the nightwalks
of the earth the sun must travel to regain the morning.
Sr~prernely, this spirit is manifest in Ingamclls' Dark Cry:
"Dark cry, claim the dark-shored Ialcc.
Quicken your echoes round the hills. Dwell
in, possessing, earth and sky. Take
farewell.
Engined with knowledge, as fast
that very way the confident mind must push
cry of a winging wild duck cast
to the insatiable hush of the bush."
17: EYES TO THE FUTURE.
For one hundred and thirty years Australian poets have
fought against the shackles of misconception. The story ol
their fight is the story of the development of Australian literature
(a story that must be told elsewhere). For one hundred

Towards an Australian Culture by Kevin Gifford (Jindyworobak Publication,
Melbourne 1944)

Collected from http://www.reasoninrevolt.net.au/pdf/b000070.pdf  on 24 Nov
2005