Looking for a good Australian history book

[flamingyouth]

I'm reading Tony Horwitz's book "Blue Latitudes," where he traces Capt. James Cook's voyages and now I'd like to read more about the settling of Australia, both about the colonial settlements and the Aboriginal peoples. Can anyone recommend a good one? I saw this book on Amazon and it was pretty highly rated: "The Fatal Shore: The epic of Australia's founding," by Robert Hughes.

Thanks for any advice. :hi:

[NWHarkness]

1. The Hughes book is good

And it's a fun read, too.

[flamingyouth]

2. Thanks - I think I'll check it out

:hi:

[no safe haven]

3. Also try Manning Clark

...A Short History of Australia.

[Matilda]

4. Manning Clark good.

Left-leaning, although not the Marxist conservatives accuse him of
being. Nice sense of humour too.

[no safe haven]

5. Yes, and lashings of irony, too

I never quite figured out what the uproar was about regarding Clark's writing. To me, it fitted very well into my way of thinking. I mean, it's a breath of fresh air compared to Geoffrey Blainey's version of our history, the tyranny of distance and all that xenophobic nonsense - ho hum.

Also a good book on one small aspect of Aboriginal history in colonial and post-colonial Australia, 'Blood on the Wattle'. Cuts right to the chase on the genocidal agenda of British settlement.

[anakie]

6. a secret country by John Pilger

is a pretty good read that offers alternative views from his leftist position. Not the sort of book that makes high school history texts.

[velvet]

7. on indigenous issues

flamingyouth, I recommend these :

"My Place" by Sally Morgan

"The Other Side of the Frontier" and other books by Henry Reynolds

"Capricornia" and "Poor Fellow My Country" by Xavier Herbert

[SweetLeftFoot]

8. All suggestions here are good

but I would also suggest "A Game Of Our Own" by Geoffrey Blainey. Baliney is a right-wing so-and-so but his study of the development of Australian Rules gives a good view of a uniquely Australian game and way of looking.

[Phoebe_in_Sydney]

9. Blainey and Manning Clark

... were the university texts when I did Australian History at uni, but that was quite some time ago now.

"Tyranny of Distance" was the Blainey book and "A short History of Australia" the Mannning Clark one.

trivial connection: Tony Horwitz married an Aussie woman who was a school classmate of mine, Geraldine Brooks. she's also a successful author.

[canberra]

10. go for Blainey and Manning Clark

The fatal shore might be a good read but isn't really a good history. Robert Hughes is an art historian, not a historian.

I'd go for the one by Blainey and the one by Manning Clark.

[rooboy]

11. Donald Horne is interesting reading...

he's the guy who coined the term "the lucky country". But he deals with contemporary history (i.e. the 50's onwards).