Aus Lit – Summative Entry

What insights has your study of Australian Literature and Art given you into the importance of creativity as part of human experience?

Australian literature has given me insights into a world which is often hard to describe and a world which is not often noticed by the rest of it. It was a rare opportunity to look at some literature and art which we don’t often view as classic so we push it to the side as we look on the more famous pieces forgetting the literature that made us and only focusing on the literature that has made the world. Whilst I am readily a creative person at heart I have always drawn my inspirations from other classical and famous works coming from the British Isles, and always perhaps undertaking this snobbish attitude to any works beneath them, saying “I was reading Chaucer or Wordworth or Yeats” instead of looking at literature that is much easier to understand and takes as much insight as those classical people.

The importance for creativity for me has turned from the fine olde English writing that I have so often viewed to be the proper way to write, and the proper way someone takes on the mountain of literature that is known to us. But Australian literature has given me a new perspective of a much more real situation, for example I have so often without even knowing it always sided with an English mind, being biased myself from my mothers heritage I have always hindered this almost elitist attitude without noticing. And so this new way of literature is truly insightful for me because it somehow seems much more real and far more free than the constraints of English ideologies, from the structured paddocks on the English hills to the messy and beautiful scenery of Australia. I have found that a creativity can be found in the messiness that is the icon of Australia with our otters with beaks and our giant rabbits cross rats.

And so finally answering the question, I have often felt that creativity is not as much important to human existence but crucial to it. Without our ability to think creatively or illogically I believe we may have lost ourselves to the world a long time ago, to the point that our language would all be one, without Australia’s colourful way of naming things or even making a plural of the word ‘you’ (youse). And so creativity is not only to me something that is important to life but crucial to my own survival.

David Malouf- Fly Away Peter

Today in Aus Lit we looked at the story of Fly away Peter in particular looking at Jim’s outlook on life. I was a bit struck with the final passages we read during tutorials in that when Imogen is thinking of Jim she is struck by one single image of Jim in this state of his true nature. And so this got me thinking on the drive home (driving to Uni is not something I usually do, and something I will not do in the future after today) and reflected on what my answers were during our tutorials in that of the ‘true self’. This although under any circumstances is a deep question to ask of oneself, and it always provokes the question of “who am I?” Now I quite often ask this question of myself, having so many fingers in different pies I often find it difficult to see a true self for example; I play piano, enjoy Jazz, play rugby and go to many games, I am both someone who goes out clubbing and the person who can sit quietly and read a book. I write, film and act and at times find myself trying to do all at once, I tutor and teach most notably but often find myself become the learner. So I ask myself who is my true self, having sought so many different vices I find myself (as modestly as I can put it) a somewhat talented person and someone who can find his way through many situations. So who am I? well trying to find myself under all these things is no easy thing, and my thoughts have turned to almost jealousy when I have read through Fly Away Peter and found someone who has found it, what I believe to be a meaning to life is to find oneself, so from the lesson I said with confidence that he has found his true self yet I cannot say that I have found me, and so before I related strongly with Jim now I feel as if I am the spectator to the world much like Imogen.

Peer Review – 7

Nice idea’s there Paul, I particularly like your comments on our different view on the importance of nature, and how that reflects through the literature we have been reading. Although our own perceptions of the importance of nature may differ, it is also funny to think that our own perceptions may be influenced unbeknownst to us by the colonists of Australia, and their lack of regard for nature has been carried down to us for generations, although us now having entered the Anthropocene epoch have found just how much influence we do have upon this earth. If you don’t know what the Anthropocene is I urge you to look it up, its a significant thing in our lives and further supports these texts in a very different way.

 

https://paulnguyen1.wordpress.com/2016/03/17/week-2-insight-on-nature-and/comment-page-1/#comment-8

‘The Cool Green’- Les Murray

The Cool Green by Les Murray is a strong poem about the effects of money on our lives and the general materialistic world that we live in. And it is interesting the choice of words that has money as both a ‘thing’ and a ‘god’. Whilst it is interesting to consider the effect of money and the state of the world today it is funny to consider in my own biases that I would choose money, so my opinion upon this analysis is biased in some respects. What Murray states many times in this poem he understands  money as this ‘Alien’ that has taken our lives, and our souls (this I will come back to). Money is as Murray says in his poem is only a small thing yet it rules our world, whilst money does not want our souls it still inadvertently received them. The cool green does control our world whether people may say that it does not rule their lives it has become this thing which has ruled them nevertheless no matter how much someone might distance themselves the cold hard grip of money will eventually catch up with them and consume them into our society based on the material.

Peer review – 6

What a sad story, I know what it is like to feel that loss and it is true that we all die eventually and that is for some the only commonality we find on this earth.  What is also common is our redemption before that life has been snuffed out, a truly happy man will still find something to regret and to ponder in their passing. I like your insights into Tolstoy and his particular characters and their struggles with themselves and the concept of death it was truly insightful.

 

https://wordpress.com/read/feeds/8743068/posts/1022254268

Peer Review – 5

What a great insight into the poem Nigel, and it accurately depicts the lives we live in the constant bland work we do. Although I am ignorant in many ways it does not mean I have not known what it has been like to go into the factory to put together the same plastic part into its same spot with that distinctive *click* as it went soundly into place, doing this for hours until the clock ticked so slowly until the point I could leave. Much as you describe it is the story of a slave to money to provide some sort of thing to my family, I have been lucky enough to escape this and work as a farm hand whilst I come to university, which in itself might bring me back to that place of slavery.

 

https://wordpress.com/read/feeds/34109517/posts/1006157388

A letter to Meg

Dear Meg,

I know what its like to finally make that connection with something you were supposed to be forbidden from. The thing you have found with Lummy is something to be adored and further it is something that not everyone can or will have. Treasure it. The truce you have made between your two family’s or that you might make is something which I am sure your Aunt would adore, Daise would certainly approve of your actions as she was one of the only ones who was able to see across everything and had no reservations about others that your mother has. I think you are finally coming into your own, and finally making yourself into your own person, not your mothers puppet to control. That itchy uniform you wear you will only need to wear for a little while longer but I believe it is going to become that little more bearable now that you have realised there may be an escape from your mothers clutches or your mothers ideas. No longer will you feel as though you have been hiding yourself or leaving some part of you behind and so you can now find your true self, that self who wants to be so like your aunt and you do that I am sure you will have no remorse for what you can and will do. Always be true to yourself and dont let yourself be lost now that you have found the real Meg.

Sincerely, Thomas

Peer Review – 4

I think it is interesting to note that money has gone from this inanimate object that is used as a tool, and has turned to this almost living breathing thing where we have phrases like “money talks”, so it has become this world dominating being that controls all. Money has not only evolved into this thing but we have even created it to become this almost godlike figure where we worship money, where we gamble, fight, kill and even enslave our fellow man to get that extra dollar. Overall it was a good insight into Les Murray’s poem and had some interesting thoughts.

 

https://brittneywebsterblog.wordpress.com/2016/05/20/blog-eight/comment-page-1/#comment-16

Appin’s Secrecy

They looked on as the dance went,
They showed the land on a sheet of paper.
The branches they put up
changed the way we ate.

They could not tell.

We could not tell them apart
not they us.

Some of us were angry,
others wanted peace.

They could not tell.

Friends we made,
others we did not.

They could not tell.

Many of us died,
many of them died.

With secrecy and despatch
they were told.
To shoot with their fiery sticks.

They could not tell.

Many of us were rounded up,
the peaceful with the violent.

They could not tell.

On that day they killed many,
but I was not.
I had to do something much different.
I made my final jump.

They would never tell now.

Peer Review – 3

Nice poem Ashley, you give a distinct description of that fateful day of the massacre, I particularly like the use of the choice of word “fourteen” and the last line “And the river is flowing” this gives a sense of both completion and a final comment of the outside world. This final line is very clever where the whole poem has been focused on the event of the massacre, and it finally ends with the sight of nature that has continued on through all these horrible events and will continue. It’s almost as if nature has watched all these things unfold but was only the spectator, and could not help in any way much as we cannot now.

https://ashleycurtis1.wordpress.com/2016/05/13/oz-lit-blog-5/comment-page-1/#comment-6