The Colonial Earth
A story of activism and idealism, of intense appreciation of Australia's remarkable environment, and of sharp awareness of the limits to colonial growth.
Awards
NSW Premier's History Prize 2001
Queensland Premier's Literary Award for Non-Fiction 2001
Shortlisted for the Victorian Premier's Literary Award 2001
Shortlisted for The Age Book of the Year 2001
Opinion
'This is a rare, enlightening and beautifully presented book. Seize it. There are only 2000 copies in this edition. It could vanish, like the heritage it celebrates, at any minute.' (Sally Blakeney, The Australian, 3-4 February 2001)
'The Colonial Earth is art history at its best. . .should be compulsory reading not only for students of nineteenth century culture but for any contemporary artist working with or in the urban, rural or wilderness landscape.' (David Hansen, Art Monthly, March 2001)
About this Title
It is conventional wisdom that Australia's colonists not only viewed their adopted land with incomprehension and distaste but also were blind to their own destructiveness. The Colonial Earth challenges this stereotype. Tim Bonyhady reveals the extraordinary breadth and depth--as well as the limits--of environmental concern in Australia from the arrival of the First Fleet until Federation.
Taking art as his starting point, Bonyhady explores how issues such as the preservation of endangered species, the protection of forests, the maintenance of public rights over the foreshore and even the likelihood of climate change already loomed large in colonial Australia.
This is a story of activism and idealism, of intense appreciation of Australia's remarkable environment, and of sharp awareness of the limits to colonial growth. It is also a story of failure: of environmental ideals sacrificed to political expediency and commercial self-interest; of innovative and enlightened laws ignored and broken.
Drawing on a remarkable array of sources--from paintings and poems to reports of public meetings and parliamentary debates--The Colonial Earth shows that an environmental aesthetic is as deep-set in the culture as our inability to turn environmental concern into practice.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction
1 Birds of Providence
2 No Person Should Have Two Houses
3 A Painter's Delight
4 Fern Fever
5 Louisa
6 The Master of the Gum Tree
7 Artists with Axes
8 The Kalizoic Brotherhood
9 Uncle Sam, the Baron and King Edward VII
10 The Flood in the Darling
11 Cremorne Pastoral
12 The Template
List of Illustrations
Abbreviations
Notes
Bibliography
Index
About the Author
Tim Bonyhady is both an art historian and environmental lawyer. His many books include Images in Opposition: Australian Landscape Painting 1801-1890; Burke and Wills: From Melbourne to Myth, and Places Worth Keeping: Conservationists, Politics and Law.
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