The figure of the lost child has haunted the Australian imagination. Peter Pierce's original and sometimes shocking study The Country of Lost Children traces this ambivalent and disturbing history. Drawing on a wide range of sources, from poetry, fiction and newspaper reports to paintings and films, The Country of Lost Children analyzes the cultural and moral implications of the lost child in Australian history and illuminates a crucial aspect of our present condition. At its core are confronting, often troubling, questions about childhood itself.

The cultural bridge that war has formed between Australia and the world is discussed in this important anthology. From the Sudan in 1885 to Afghanistan in 2001, these lively essays connect war and travel in the observations of writers such as "Banjo" Paterson, George Johnston, Nancy Wake, John Pilger, and Peter Weir. A combination of writings from combatants abroad and retrospective travelers to foreign battlefields and war site reveals how the experience of war has broadened, refined, and even distorted Australian views of the world.

Today the mere mention of Vietnam conjures up images of protest in American streets and tensions so strong they divided a country. Yet the United States did not fight alone. Comparatively little is known about Australia's experience-its motives for entering the conflict, national support for Australia's role there, and how that nation dealt with the aftermath of war. Here, Jeff Doyle, Jeffrey Grey, and Peter Pierce chronicle Australia's complicated involvement in Vietnam.
Australia's decision to participate in the conflict was part of a collective Western effort to stop Communist...

The Cambridge History of Australian Literature is the most comprehensive volume ever written on Australia s national literature. This authoritative guide spans Australian literary history from colonial origins, encompassing indigenous and migrant literatures, as well as representations of Asia and the Pacific and the role of literary culture in modern Australian society. Bringing together a distinguished line-up of contributors, this volume explores each of the literary modes in an Australian context, including short story, poetry, children s literature, autobiography and fiction. This book...