The Words That Made Australia

This is not a book of documents, snippets or worthy speeches. Instead it presents the original essays and the moments of insight that told us what Australia is and could be.

These are the essential statements – from historians, reporters, novelists, mavericks and visionaries – that take us from Federation to the present-day, and tell a story of national self-discovery.

There is the Frenchman who saw that Australia was a 'workingman's paradise', and the historian who explained why.

The two reporters who realised the true significance of Gallipoli and conveyed it to the nation.

Russel Ward on the Australian Legend, Robin Boyd on the Australian Ugliness, Donald Horne on the Lucky Country, W.E.H. Stanner on the Great Australian Silence and Anne Summers on Manzone Country.

Real Matildas, Cultural Cringers, Future Eaters and Forgotten People – and much more.

Memorably written and cohesive, this is the essential sourcebook of the words that made Australia.

Includes essays by Miles Franklin, Albert Metin, Ellis Ashmead-Bartlett, Keith Murdoch, Maybanke Anderson, D.H. Lawrence, W.K. Hancock, P.R. Stephensen, Vance Palmer, Robert Menzies, A.A. Phillips, Manning Clark, Russel Ward, Barry Humphries, Robin Boyd, Donald Horne, W.E.H. Stanner, Humphrey McQueen, Hugh Stretton, Anne Summers, Miriam Dixson, Bernard Smith, Paul Kelly, Geoffrey Blainey, Tim Flannery, David Malouf, Inga Clendinnen, Noel Pearson, Judith Brett and Ghassan Hage.

About the Author

Robert Manne (born 31 October 1947) is a professor of politics at La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia.

Born in Melbourne, Manne's earliest political consciousness was formed by the fact that his parents were Jewish refugees from Europe and his grandparents were victims of the Holocaust. He was educated at the University of Melbourne (BA) and the University of Oxford (BPhil) during the 1960s and 1970s. His university teaching focuses on twentieth-century European politics (including the Holocaust), Communism, and Australian politics, and he has undertaken research in areas such as censorship, anti-semitism, asylum seekers and mandatory detention, Australia's involvement in the Iraq war, the Stolen Generations, and the "history wars" of the 1990s.

He is married to journalist and social philosopher Anne Manne.