Writing in Hope and Fear: Literature as Politics in Postwar Australia

For most of the postwar period, Australian literary debate was marked by the division between radical nationalists on the Left and cultural conservatives on the Right. John McLaren's broad cultural history traces the origins of these conflicts, discusses key literary works and major journals, and focuses on the individuals involved in various sagas and struggles. McLaren shows that writing became a form of politics itself, expressing either hope or fear about the revolution that was perceived to be imminent, as well as reflecting society more broadly. The work of politically committed writers is closely examined, as is the response to ostensibly unpolitical writers. McLaren also considers the new journalism and the work of younger poets. He shows that it was not until the changes brought by the 1960s and the Whitlam government that literature was truly freed from these constraints.