Australian /lit/ discussion

What about my guy Richard Flanagan tho

>Further, due to the fetishisation of the past/history, a feeling of inferiority is created, since the rest of the world has already "had" their culture, and it is so to speak too late for us. Like an adolescent trying to join a conversation with elderly people who clearly have much life experience.

This is why Australian nationalism is retarded. Even more LARPy than /pol/ style nationalism

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>>9226210
It's too late Pham. Literally nothing good is coming out of this country ever again. Have you seen what an English course looks like in our high schools? I'm pretty sure 2/3 of my classmates didn't even read the books in year 12. What are Australians going to write about? Australia doesn't have a culture anymore. It's been systematically obliterated in favour of being cosmopolitan with a slight tinge of those stupid memes you referred to in your post (see Australia Day probably being moved to May 8th soon and other such poz).

Nobody in this country thinks. Our schools are garbage and social capital is gone. No sense of community or unity or whatever else. Just ice, increasingly unwatchable sport and a silent acceptance that things are just going to keep getting worse and we can't stop it.

>>9226236
>Australian nationalism is retarded
What would you have us do?

>>9226249
Write about it. Criticise it. Some sort of art in dissent. No good literature ever came from congratulating a given culture.

>>9226249
>What would you have us do?
Not be nationalist. Not out because nationalism is evil or what have you. You just have no right to be.

At best you could glorify the motherland.

>>9226290
>Glorify the motherland
I'd be behind this. And it's more or less what Australian nationalism used to be. 100 years ago Australians seemed to more or less consider themselves British, and beyond that Australian culture was just a more outdoorsy British culture. I wish Australians still saw themselves as British in a new land, rather than a bunch of rootless post-colonial nothings.

>>9226289
>No good literature ever came from congratulating a given culture.
Very debatable. If I were the type to bother with good literature I'd probably have several examples against this. Cultural critique sounds like a good idea, but good luck getting it published if you aren't a refugee or an abo.

>>9226289

>No good literature ever came from congratulating a given culture

Boy, you're wrong about that. Just as there is also funny and relevant satire that makes fun of the weak, the stupid, the poor, and so on.

>>9226313
Okay, good point actually. I was wrong.

I guess I just feel that any literature that congratulates things as they are isn't doing its job. I was, and am, equating the value 'good' with 'challenging'.

>>9226236
No such thing, Australia is a state, not a nation. Nationalism is, by definition, tied to ethnicity.

>>9226327
>No such thing, Australia is a state, not a nation
No need to tell me. Tell the dumbass bogan Australians.

>Nationalism is, by definition, tied to ethnicity.
No it's tied to nation. shit like shared culture, language etc.

Australian has none of these things unique to itself. It's language is English and it's culture is just watered down American/British.

>>9226343
No, nation is primarily about a shared ethnicity. That's what it means. It comes from the Latin natio, which means race.

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>>9226210
We had a thread about this a week or two ago. https://warosu.org/lit/thread/S9190582

Australian culture is fucked. LARPing as Britons really isn't an option anymore, and even during the early 20th century is had its problems. The British Empire is gone.

Since the 1940s at least, Australianism pretty much died and we're not stuck immitating Yank culture and forcing cultural cringe upon ourselves ("cunt", "VB", "she'll be roight m8") in order to pretend we have a culture. Meanwhile since the 70s we've had multiculturalism forced upon us and some of our major cities/suburbs have become unrecognisable, and indistinguishable from the "global cities" of North America and Asia.

>>9226327
>No such thing, Australia is a state, not a nation. Nationalism is, by definition, tied to ethnicity.

There is arguably an Australian ethnicity, an Anglo-Celtic-European conglomeration. If you out into the country or into certain suburbs, it's absolute recognisable. Wogs and asians even refer to Anglo-Celts as "Aussies".

>>9226210
>>9226289
What do we do? Action has to be taken. We can't simply wait. Waiting will bring on only two things. A) Australia becomes a multi-cult-consumerist mongrel nation where no-one belongs, all cultures are present and thereby no coherent culture can arise. A nation of deracinated individuals fueled by consumption and lower instincts. Some cyber-punk dystopian fiction could come from this, but there will in no way be "Australian."

Or B) Australia collapses, and goes full Mad Max or C) Chinese invade because our population has aged to the point where we can't defend ourselves.

Percy Stephensen (1901-1965, Former Communist who went far-right) had similar concerns in his essay about Australian literature published in 1936. He articulated alarmingly similar concerns that we are recognising today

http://home.alphalink.com.au/~radnat/stephensen/

See "The Foundations of Culture in Australia"

Excerpt, chapter 19
>Viewed in historical retrospect, I think that Archibald’s Bulletin has had a dubious effect on Australian literature, and on culture in Australia. It has presented a larrikin view of Australian life. It has made the larrikin idea paramount, as in an earlier phase convictism was paramount. The larrikin and the convict are not representative citizens, though they are dramatic citizens. Convicts and larrikins in Australian literature have been what redskins and cowboys were to American literature—a fiction travesty of the representative life.

>>9226398
I agree that anyone who isn't Anglo-Celtic isn't truly Australian.

>>9226398
Cont-

Exceprt, chapter 3
>What is a national culture? Is it not the expression, in thought-form or art-form, of the spirit of a Race and of a Place? The Ancient Greeks were few in number, not more all told than the number of people who nowadays live in North Sydney, but the Greeks evolved, from their environment and historical background, a culture which has remained for 2,000 years after they themselves became subjugated and dispersed. The political, economic, and social forms of a nation are temporary forms, expressions of the Zeitgeist, which changes with every decade, with every vagary of invention, epidemics, wars, migrations. Each decade of history is "modern" to itself, and every modernism passes with the inexorable march of time. Nothing is permanent in a nation except its culture—its ideas of permanence, which are expressed in art, literature, religion, philosophy; ideas which transcend modernism and ephemerality, ideas which survive political, social, and economic changes.

>Race and Place are the two permanent elements in a culture, and Place, I think, is even more important than Race in giving that culture its direction. When Races migrate, taking their culture with them, to a new Place, the culture becomes modified. It is the spirit of a Place which ultimately gives any human culture its distinctiveness.

>Consider the differences between Indian Art, Chinese Art, Persian Art, Egyptian Art, Dutch Art, Easter Island Art—expressions of places rather than of epochs. The main art tendency remained in each Place while peoples and epochs changed.

>I hold to the thesis that cultures are created locally, and that every contribution to world culture (even in a future world-political-and-economic unit) must be distinct with the colour of its place of origin.

Excerpt - Chapter 34
>Sheep-culture, agriculture, physical culture, have reached high standards in Australia, but intellectual culture has been neglected. We require now to grow to fuller intellectual stature—to become a nation in all attainments. Not in a day, and not in many days, will a journey in this direction be done; but a beginning can be mad; and, in fact, has been made.

>In matters concerning the only culture that endures—preservation, development, breeding, growth of living ideas—the inferiority complex of the Australian will be removed, and is being removed, by a bold gesture of those in the Commonwealth to-day to whom the very word Australia is a full and rich music. Our Australia, ours to hold and develop, ours to define, by our own virtue and power. Our giant scroll on which a new story will be written. . . .

If you're interested in an indigenous Australian culture and literature, this essay is a must read.

>The other option, which tastes sour to me, is that of whoring ourselves out to the Meme in exchange for scraps of culture cringe. (see: "hey cunt", general loose slander, "spiders", "everything in australia wants to kill you", bogans, beer, "radiation").
This, a thousand times this. Australian comedy is cancerous for this reason.
OP I think think that culture takes a long time to produce things, and that's unavoidable. Wait for our population to grow, wait for mannerisms to develop, wait for memes to settle and wait for our identity to manifest. Not to get political but I don't think that multiculturalism (not multiracialism) is going to help that. The attitude against Australian culture in opposition to colonialism (which is obviously bad) and in favour of global culture has kind of stopped us from forming a proper cultural foundation. Even if you disagree with the nation state, it's where all the classics were created, or, at least, it was a necessary step in their creation.
Personally I think we should definitely break ties with the British monarch and become a republic or at least an independent sovereign nation in order to signify the fact that we are a distinct people.
And of course we could create. Write, paint, speak and work. Australia does have artistic capacity and talent. Unfortunately it's being spent on bohemian crap. Melbourne has lots of musical talent but it's not incredibly original or innovative.

>>9226482
>Not to get political but I don't think that multiculturalism (not multiracialism) is going to help that.

Multiculturalism and multracialism are inseparable.

>>9226425
Didn't think abos had literature or culture.

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>>9226210
We need to write our own stories.
Think small, write a novel about your shitty little suburb or town. Tell the story of life there even if it's a joke. Even if you live in a bogan shithole. Tell us about that bogan shithole.
Ignore the big issues, ignore the rest of the world. Just tell your stories and let people make of them what they wil.
pic related, classic 90's Aussie novel "Praise" by Andrew Mcgahan. A prime example of what i'm talking about.

>>9226506
When I mean "indigenous Australian culture" I don't mean pre-1788 indigenous "culture". However, there are arguments that Aboriginal myths and concepts could be integrated into Australian culture to enhance its roots and sense of Place.

>>9226513
No non-abo really gives a shit about their primitive beliefs. Australians don't like myths at all. Australians glorify a different ideal, while Asians are like ants.

>>9226490
Temporary migration with pauses for integration is multiracialism without multiculturalism. A nation could even be monocultural with open borders if it had deep culture and high expectations/standards for integration.

>>9226523
>Temporary migration with pauses for integration is multiracialism without multiculturalism.

And there is virtually no successful example of this throughout history.

>>9226521
Define "primitive beliefs"?

>>9226532
Nor is there successful examples of "monocultural/monoracial" societies.

All these societies collapse for one reason or other. Real redpill is race and culture aren't the root cause.

>>9226509
Exactly. That's what I'm doing. I'll see where it goes.

>>9226547
>Nor is there successful examples of "monocultural/monoracial" societies. All these societies collapse for one reason or other.

>because nothing lasts forever then it's a failure

You can't be serious.

>Real redpill is race and culture aren't the root cause.

Let me guess, you're a dialectical materialist?

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>>9226532
America was successfully multiracial up until the welfare state was established. If the government became smaller instead of larger, the United States would currently be a multiracial monocultural nation. It has taken mankind a long time, but after the reformation, enlightenment and American revolution, we were finally able to overcome certain human evils. Unfortunately those evils have since reappeared.

>>9226573
>because nothing lasts forever then it's a failure
>You can't be serious.
You employed the same logic for so-called multicultural societies.

>Let me guess, you're a dialectical materialist?
Yeah bro. So long as you and dumbass liberals continue to have your manufactured culture war the both of you are going to continue to be fucked in the arse.

Thankfully the Trump administration is accelerating the conflict.

The Secret River by Kate Grenville was good.

but jeff down the road doesn't care about literature, culture or arts at all. all he cares about is taking the boat out on the weekend, drinking beer with his mates and watching footy.

>>9226580

can you further elaborate? I'm not sure if you're counting pre-civil rights movement and such as when the US was a successful multiracial mono-cultural nation because that's wonderfully ignorant if you are.

I don't think America could have ever been such a state, perhaps in the future it could be but never in the past.

>>9226586
But is it really any different anywhere else? Personally I don't think it is. The past, and other cultures, only seem so intellectually grand because the western canon is essentially a meta glorification of the past. Which is fine, because it produces fucking great stuff. But you seem to be just doing exactly that; glorifying the past. If you really think about it, what is the ratio of big-name-authors to nobodies in a given time? Minimal. Shit only seems grand in retrospect. I bet the guy down the road from Joyce, Pynchon, Nietzsche, Beckett, Ezra Pound, whoever, didn't give a flying fuck about
>literature, culture or arts at all
-- just getting by another night with a good meal and sufficient sleep and something fun at a base level to break up the monotony.

I've heard good things about Gerald Murnane. Thoughts on him?

>>9226604
>glorifying the past

seems to be happening a lot recently, sign of the times

>>9226586
At least he's happy. Jamal in Melbourne only cares about raping, stealing, and killing and he is angry all the time.

>>9226222
Yes anon, Narrow Road to the Deep North will be remembered as one of the great Australian novels, even if it drastically needed editing

>>9226210
>Ned Kelly is a meme at this point.
Top kekkle my dekkle.

>>9226580
You completely disregard the effect of segregation and the great migration. America was absolutely not a successful multi-racial nation up until the welfare state. Even among whites (Irish Catholics and WASPs etc) there was considerable tension and strife. The US was never "one society" either.

>>9226581
>You employed the same logic for so-called multicultural societies.

No. I said multiracial societies were never successful to begin with. Mono-racial societies go through cyclical phases of rise and decline (Just because someone dies of old-age, does this mean their life was a "failure"?). Multiracial societies almost always fail from the get-go, or are almost always maintained by more powerful monoracial societies (i.e Empires)..

>Yeah bro. So long as you and dumbass liberals continue to have your manufactured culture war the both of you are going to continue to be fucked in the arse.

Well kindly fuck off, because this is a cultural literature thread.

>>9226614
OP here.
>Well kindly fuck off, because this is a cultural literature thread.

Yes, but that doesn't mean mono-culture literature thread. Is there anything so unfeasible in a culture resulting from clashing cultures? If hegel is right, and all conflicts seek a resolution, in some direction, whatever direction, then why can't that resultant culture be the hypothetical culture we're talking about? Or better yet actually be intellectually honest hear people's arguments, then weigh them up against others and your own after? Or am I about to be told my ideals for argument are too unrealistic?

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>>9226599
Obviously pre-civil rights movement America was not successfully multiracial, but the time between the tail end of civil rights and the beginning of the welfare state was where we were beginning to see a genuine multiracial society driven by Calvinist work ethic. I'm not saying that a multiracial, monocultural society comes easily, but it's completely possible. However, it cannot exist unless we rid our culture of ethnonationalism, tribalism, collectivism, liberalism and socialism. I admit that I'm being idealistic but I am just holding mankind to a high standard.

>>9226635
I'll take idealism, albeit *reasonable* idealism, over fatalism any day. Fatalism and cynicism disgust me. What a failure of human spirit.

>>9226210

I'm gonna be this nation's James Joyce just watch

>>9226604
You're making it sound like the writers you mentioned didn't also just seek to 'break the monotony' every once in a while. The reason we remember them is because they were, at their core, normal people gifted with extraordinary talents. They lived and died, and probably fell victim to the same mistakes any of us would make throughout our lives.

The problem is that Australian culture takes pride in its homogeneity. Its a society that rewards assimilation at the expense of cultural nourishment. 'Artists' are dismissed by the average Joe as glorified, self-aggrandizing welfare cheats. Of course exceptional literature can't flourish in this setting- the people who do write think they're superior to the common man, and the common man doesn't want to write because these narcissistic buffoons are setting the rules to an increasingly unattractive game.

>>9226210
>Patrick White is adept at creating psychologies, and he did want to write about Australia. But his heart was in England. He had no ear for the Australian language, either. A non-Australian would be forgiven for thinking he was writing about British towns, environs and people.

this is crap, have you ever read patrick white?
he said his heart was in england, but australia was in his blood. the tree of man and voss are australian to the core.

also patrick white is the greatest english language novelist since joyce yeah

Getting a lot of Anglo-vibes from this thread.

Just FYI, wogs and asians look at your culture from an outsiders point of view. It's a perspective that was drummed into us by our elders and peers (i.e, anecdotally; Australian's smell, Australian's can't cook, Australians are barbaric, etc).

This has created the cultural void, where you have an increasing population of individuals who identify with some diasporic warped understanding of their ethnic identity, more so than Australia as a whole.

How can this be conducive of a collective identity, and then, art?

>>9226627
I understand what you mean. However, the very need to discuss culture is a good indication that you've lost it.

What are we referring to when we mean "Australian culture"?

For me, it's an offshoot of British culture, infused with the sense of Place created by the uniqueness of the Australian landscape. But beyond that, it's really quite adolescent. We never escaped the colonial mindset to truly become our own. The cultural cringe of "roughian, larrakin," memes are an attempt to look-back and grasp something uniquely Australian, but it's a relic of a bygone era, of a colonial people still under the wing of the British Empire.

As soon as the Empire died, Australia's cultural development declined with it. Menzies' "British to the Bootstrap" mentality probably didn't help, but I am emphatic that multiculturalism/multiracialism is absolutely not the way forward, and has infact contributed to the stunted growth of an Adult Australiana, because it affirms the Other over the indigenous.

Percy Stephensen's "Foundations of Culture in Australia" recognised this as far back as the 1930s. >>9226398 >>9226425

>>9226635
>I admit that I'm being idealistic but I am just holding mankind to a high standard.

Admirable, but mankind will always fail you. Human-beings are in many respects driven by fear and irrationarily. A society founded upon Reason is doomed to fail, as that same Reason can be used to deconstruct it a day later.

>>9226652
>The problem is that Australian culture takes pride in its homogeneity. Its a society that rewards assimilation at the expense of cultural nourishment. 'Artists' are dismissed by the average Joe as glorified, self-aggrandizing welfare cheats. Of course exceptional literature can't flourish in this setting- the people who do write think they're superior to the common man, and the common man doesn't want to write because these narcissistic buffoons are setting the rules to an increasingly unattractive game.

I think the problem you are actually identifying is Australia's inherently egalitarian ethos. Homogeneity is fine for the most part, but when a culture rejects social hierarchy and thereby cultural rankings, every literary endeavor is reduced to the common denominator. In a healthy society, a culture will be lead by it's aristocrats, and thereby mediated down to the masses.

>>9226670
>Admirable, but mankind will always fail you. Human-beings are in many respects driven by fear and irrationarily.
So because we have a 1% chance of becoming better people, we shouldn't try to become better people?

>>9226684
You can't change human nature. I'd rather go off centuries of healthy prejudice than bet on such a social experiment.

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I hate living in this garbage non-country so much. I'd be willing to fuck off and leave it all to the abos if England wasn't now looking equally as awful.

>>9226720
iktf

>>9226668
It can't. Which is why Wogs and Asians can fuck off.

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FITZY!

>>9226614
>No. I said multiracial societies were never successful to begin with.
>the sole world superpower was never successful.
sure thing.

>Well kindly fuck off, because this is a cultural literature thread.
This isn't a safespace echochamber

>>9226745
There's nothing that indicates that multiracial societies are inherently a good thing. Look at Latin America to see how shit's fucked there.

What's for dinner tonight mate? Microwaved frozen pizza? How's your mum's new boyfriend? What's it like being 8th generation and still living in the western suburbs? Etc etc.

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>be australian
>mfw people say australia has no culture when some absolute legend has posted this meme >>9226744

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>>9226754
You are welcome friend, I rarely post rare waleeds outside of pol

It feels like any attempt at developing our own culture is smothered in the tidal wave of american cultural imperialism, with china leering around the edges. Our tv, movie, music, and games industries are completely dominated by the US.
What can we do? Would things like forcing tv and radio stations to play more australian content even help at this point?
Or should we just buckle down and desperately try to create meaningful content that is unique to australia?

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>>9226758
Love me some Waleed memes

>>9226753
Crap meant to reply to >>9226728

....Maybe wogs really are retarded...

>>9226670
>I think the problem you are actually identifying is Australia's inherently egalitarian ethos. Homogeneity is fine for the most part, but when a culture rejects social hierarchy and thereby cultural rankings, every literary endeavor is reduced to the common denominator. In a healthy society, a culture will be lead by it's aristocrats, and thereby mediated down to the masses.

You're on the mark except for that last sentence. Literary culture specifically has always been about saying what should not be said. It rejects orthodoxy and celebrates the individual with his many permutations. And while Australian culture promotes egalitarianism, the economic reality of Australian life would point otherwise. Our culture inhibits the presence of honest, incisive literature because we've been told that there is fundamentally nothing wrong with the way things are, and I'm a firm believer that the greatest literary works are acts of dissent.

>>9226765
I think one of things which really shows Australian 'culture' is the Betoota Advocate.

http://www.betootaadvocate.com/headlines/waleed-aly-to-deliver-introspective-monologue-through-belgian-flag-filter-tonight/

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If you don't mind homos this was a pretty good book. It captured the washed out feeling of living in a shitty aussie town with a bogan friend pretty well.

>>9226745
>implying the US was a successful multiracial society.

>>9226763
>It feels like any attempt at developing our own culture is smothered in the tidal wave of american cultural imperialism, with china leering around the edges. Our tv, movie, music, and games industries are completely dominated by the US.
This is one of the key problems, and it will be almost insurmountable.

>Or should we just buckle down and desperately try to create meaningful content that is unique to australia?
This is likely our best bet. But we can do other things concurrently.

>>9226747
>There's nothing that indicates that multiracial societies are inherently a good thing.
I never said they're inherently good.

>Look at Latin America to see how shit's fucked there.
Going to need an actual argument to prove race is the cause of that.

>>9226774
Interesting notion. But I am skeptical of contrarianism for the sake of contrarianism. "Dissent" to what end?

>>9226774
I've been listening to the band TISM lately, and they're a good example of this. They poke fun at things that are serious matters while trying to say something worth saying, but also packaged in a way that's palatable for the common listener. They also neatly skirt around the issue of australia's "tall poppy syndrome" culture by relentlessly taking the piss out of themselves while doing the same to everything else around them.
You can absolutely game the egalitarianism of our society if you're clever and present yourself carefully.

>>9226777
>implying 20-somethings in any country have an interesting culture or represent the culture of that country

>>9226793
20-somethings?

Clancy and Errol are 30 or 40 somethings.

>>9226795
Their fans are 20-somethings tho

>>9226795
Aye? Don't think so.

>>9226791
Irony is a powerful and useful cultural took, but I feel that it is ultimately destructive, and if made the basis of a culture, it can be ultimately dangerous and unstable.

A culture needs to have some positive affirmation of something. It can't be built on irony.

>>9226805
What is honestly funnier - and is actually attempting to be funny?

I'm asking genuinely.

>>9226811
You're right. It's a useful tool for pointing out what's wrong in a society while being able to shield yourself from any backlash, but that's where it ends.
So what positives can we find in our society? Do the classics of mateship and hard yakka still apply? It's hard to see what's uniquely australian through the deluge of US culture at the moment.

>>9226697
>You can't change human nature.
Yes you can, we're doing it right now. The reason we're not raping our neighbours is because we're currently resisting human nature. I fully agree that humans are inherently depraved, but I believe that we can free ourselves from that with intense discipline and faith.
>I'd rather go off centuries of healthy prejudice than bet on such a social experiment.
Well, my original contention was that it is multiculturalism, rather than multiracialism, that has prevented Australia from forming a deep and unique identity with cultural and artistic innovations. My point is that multiracialism can work but multiculturalism cannot. Integration happens all the time, but coexisting belief systems cannot naturally cooperate in any intimate way. Again, the United States is an example of multiracialism being feasible before being ruined by multiculturalism - with a cultural shift away from the notion of "American". The welfare state, affirmative action, identity politics and social justice are all rooted in the idea that we should hold people to different standards rather than allowing a real standard to dictate culture and behaviour. This exists in academia, where minorities and poor people are held to lower standards, in the private sector where racial quotas exist, and in the public sector where it is believed that minority leaders can solve minority problems. America was supposed to be a free society where standards were set spontaneously according to market demands, which involves all groups progressing towards an ideal - rather than all groups tolerating one another. That is the difference between multiracialism and multiculturalism. One is the idea that we can cooperate despite racial differences, voluntarily building economy and culture. The other is the idea that people are inherently good and can get along if we just wave a magic government wand because the institutions will save us.

I liked Carpentaria by Alexis Wright

>>9226793

culture isn't interesting until it becomes history

>>9226832
>Yes you can, we're doing it right now. The reason we're not raping our neighbours is because we're currently resisting human nature.

You're putting your faith in humanity, when you should ultimately be putting it in God. That should be the fundamental foundation of all societies. The large swathes of humanity can resist doing murderous things, but the moment that the environment changes, man can become a ravenous beast. They operate in response to fear and power.

Human's have free-will, but the vast majority of humanity will simply allow for their lower instincts to tyrannize over them the moment shit hits the fan.

>>9226249
>Have you seen what an English course looks like in our high schools? I'm pretty sure 2/3 of my classmates didn't even read the books in year 12

My school was much worse than that.

Is our Gen Z going to be similar to America's or will it be less reactionary and therefore more similar to the Millennials?

What is even unique about Australia these days?

>>9226872
Fucking nothing. Seriously fuck this place, I wish I was a Swede.

>>9226784
Not necessarily dissent, but expressions of discontent. Great works of world literature are usually rejections of a societal norm particular to that country. Australian culture encourages the individual to maintain this illusion that everything is fine just how it is. If American culture is about finding happiness through struggle, then Australian culture is about finding happiness through comfort. And if the common man is an extension of his culture, it stands to reason that he manifests its deficiencies too. So many great writers have come out of the US because of their ethos of resilience.

>>9226867
>That should be the fundamental foundation of all societies.

which god?

>>9226886
>Not necessarily dissent, but expressions of discontent.

But a literary culture can't just critique, it has to positively affirm something as well. Otherwise all it is is deconstructing.

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>>9226890
God. The One. The transcendent Absolute.

>>9226886
>So many great writers have come out of the US because of their ethos of resilience.

Are you sure it has nothing to do with their much larger population and more varied history?

>>9226895

Oh yeah? What's his name?

>>9226886
>Australian culture is about finding happiness through comfort.
I agree, although I want to add it usually manifests as a promotion of "mateship", spending time with your family (bbqs, etc), drinking, and increasingly watching tv. We're a very leisure obsessed society these days.

>>9226867
>You're putting your faith in humanity
No I'm not, as I said, I believe that we can free ourselves from that with intense discipline and faith. I recognise that leaders are elected by God and that nations become repentant because of God. In his sovereignty he gives nations up to their desires and turns other nations away from sin. The fact that the universe was created and is sustained by God does not mean we shouldn't try to enact repentance and ultimately rid nations of sin. And if there were no sin, we would peacefully cooperate, create and share. We wouldn't use violence on others or harm ourselves. If God changed our nation, we would overlook differences like race and class. We would all work toward the same ideal rather than settle for less.

>>9226902
Need more Protestant work ethic. If Australia was settled by Puritans instead of Catholics we would be the best country in the world right now

>>9226910
You're confusing Earth for the Kingdom of Heaven.

>>9226910

You're using the word "God" as just another word for causality or fate. Reconsider your life.

>>9226915
>Australia was settled by Catholics.

um what

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>Australians
>Mattering

>>9226210
Australia doesn't have culture. We suck, collectively. I'm in year 12 lit, and people can't get beyond year 8 level comprehension. I'm doing philosophy, and we have to stop every paragraph of Descartes because people simply don't know the words-if the young people don't have basic reading comprehension, how are we going to produce any great writers?

>>9226882
I dunno, we have some pretty unique spiders and snakes.

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>>9226910
Calvinist scum, kys desu

>>9226916
Earth is fallen, but the people of God are saved. Improving human life is a blessing from God, giving up is an acceptance of sin and a result of sin.
Jesus said the Kingdom of God is within you.

>>9226918
God caused the universe and decided our fate. We are created beings.

>>9226941
>God caused the universe and decided our fate.

nah

>>9226933
>christian advocating suicide

I want this Christianity meme to die

>>9226928
>Australia doesn't have culture. We suck, collectively. I'm in year 12 lit

HAHAHA

>>9226947
I'm talking to a Calvinist, they can't commit suicide because they aren't people.

>>9226948
Tell us about Australian culture anon.

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>>9226928
This

>tfw doomed to live in a pleb nation, soon to be overtaken by asians

JUST

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>>9226915
Anon, tell me you're joking

>>9226961
Feels bad man. It's probably why we shitpost so much. A collective rebellion against poor internet and a deadend country.

>>9226509

Absolutely that's what I'm trying to do and it feels good too

>>9226668
>>9226728

Yeah I mean without being all fuck off we're full this seems like a wogs and asians problem, blame your grandparents for telling you to see it that way

>>9226992
In some sense you're right. Australian culture is deracinated due to our own failings, not foreigners.

But they sure as hell haven't helped, and have definitely made it worse.

What's the best place to start with aus lit?

>>9227084
http://4chanlit.wikia.com/wiki/Recommended_Reading/Literature_by_origin

>>9226978
Interested. What's it about?

I think OP is being too harsh when he implies that Australia only has the rudiments of a unique cultural idiom - perhaps this is the case if one considers only the "shrimp on the barbie/gizza beer mate" stereotype, but read Lawson and Paterson and tell me that there isn't a distinctive cultural idiom there, there most certainly is. The same goes for Jerilderie, while it is a meme it's well-known for a reason, and while we're on this subject, no mention of Les Murray, who's a one-man refutation of your assertion that an Australian idiom is lacking.

Population size combined with brain drain is undoubtedly a factor, but there's also this self-loathing trap that you've fallen into that bears some responsibility for the paucity of good Australian literature. White's a classic case of this - he writes a novel in Voss that really bloody is a Great Australian Novel (whatever amorphous bullshit people say that is) but he remains attached to the notion that Australia is essentially barren, uninteresting. Well of course it is if you keep sitting there saying it is and do nothing about it. Too many Australian writers or would-be Australian writers fall into this trap, but as others in the thread have said, while there's not much there certainly are a few things to go on - Flanagan's Narrow Road to the Deep North, White's Voss, Lawson's short stories, Kenneth Slessor's poems, Les Murray...there is more, and not only men!

t. thoroughly un-Australian Englishman with an Aussie-resident father and siblings

>>9227503
Thanks or this. Now that I think of it, I remember I picked up Les Murray's collected poems at a book store once, but never got it. Is this regret I feel?

>>9227674
If you're looking for a great poet who happens to be a great Australian poet too, then Les is fantastic. Sprawl is great, so's Burning Want...maybe I'm exaggerating by saying that Fredy Neptune is to Australia what The Divine Comedy is to Italy but the comparison isn't wholly spurious.

Australia is and has always been a progressive nation. I don't mean that in the usual political sense. I mean that the Emu and Kangaroo on the Coat of Arms (two animals who, at the time, people believed couldn't move backwards) tells you what you need to know about the country. In very short periods of time, Australia decided to switch to metric, changed the currency, changed to polymer banknotes.

Australia has very little respect for tradition, nostalgia, or even really hierarchy. But, on top of that, I feel like Australia has always been pretty utilitarian in its thinking. Uniquely Australian houses are built for the environment and utility; Australia has made great advances in science and tech, but virtually none in the arts; trades and "useful professions" are valued; heavy focus on livability and development arguably at the expense of culture, and people don't really believe in much of anything either (protests barely exist and the only time there was ever a coup was because the government wanted to remove rum as a form of currency).

This just came out like a bunch of ramblings and they are mostly just personal observations, but to understand Australian national identity all you really need to understand is "the outback" and World War 1. I don't think anything else has had the effect on Australian identity that these two things have. The only enduring theme in Australian art is the conflict between the harsh outback and western civilisation. I feel like we've just been caught up trying to tame this horrid country for 200 years. We don't have time to make art.

Isn't Australia, just like Canada, an enclave of American cultural imperialism?

>>9226928

Australia does produce a high amount of philosophers, though, considering the size of the country. And they aren't insignificant: Singer, Chalmers, Mackie, Smart, Oppy, etc

>>9227854
The Australia you describe sounds like materialistic, soulless shit-hole.

>>9227892

It sounds worse than it is. I think the harshness of the bush forced people to work for what they wanted. It made tough men. But, and these are just my personal observations, I think the result is that Australians don't seem to have much use as a society for things that aren't useful.

Materialistic, maybe, but it depends how you use that term. You can't get away with buying shit for status in Australia because if you boast, you will be taken down a few pegs. It's not consumerist, really. But materialistic as in this is all there is, yeah probably.

>>9227892
Good. Stay in third-worldistan you god loving faggot.

>>9227951
I am an Australian you Godless cretin.

>>9227913
>It's not consumerist, really.

In my experience, Australians are yank-tier consumerists.

protip: national literature is bullshit and doesn't exist

all i see ITT is reactionary - if you haven't read any australian writing you like, fuck off - it doesn't matter. there's as much of a cultural explanation for your inferiority complex as there is for people who read aus writing and get on with their lives.

same to you 'australia can do it' assholes - australia doesn't need a nobel prize. no country needs a nobel prize. no country needs 'great literature'.

>yet to see anyone mention anything you cant find in the fucking newspaper or on a wikipedia article about 'Australian literature'
>ITT: entry level idiots think they know what 'Australian Literature' is

>>9227995
>I am an Australian you Godless cretin.
Take your sand juju back to Raqqa Muhammad

http://www.poetrylibrary.edu.au/poets/fogarty-lionel/frisky-poem-and-risky-0214020

>>9228054
>national literature is bullshit and doesn't exist

>all i see ITT is reactionary

Anarchist faggot detected.