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Antipodean America: Australasia and the Constitution of U.S. Literature by Paul Giles
JUDGES' COMMENTS
Covering more than two hundred years of Australian and United States literary and cultural history this study constitutes a cauldron of ideas about Australasian and more significantly, about American literature. It is the persuasive argument of this book that Australian writing, both in the colonial and post-Federation periods, exercised a significant influence on the writings of major American writers, extending from Benjamin Franklin to Henry Adams. It is a surprising but tenaciously and convincingly argued thesis.
The great strengths of this book are first, that in covering such a large period of literary endeavour its arguments are always underpinned by a huge weight of evidence, clearly demonstrating the author’s command of the subject. Second, in demonstrating that American literature can be classified as international rather than national in terms of form and influence, Paul Giles has laid bare the once unchallengeable belief in American cultural exceptionalism.