Russel Ward, The Australian Legend - Book Review Essay -- essays resea

When writing the "big picture" histories, historians often overlook or exaggerate certain aspects of Australian history to make their point. Discuss with reference to one the recommended texts.The book "The Australian myth", written by Russell Ward and published in 1958 speaks mainly of "Australian Identity". It looks at nationalism and what has formed our self-image. There atomic number 18 many aspects that are left overlooked however, as the Authour makes his assumptions. Significant parts of society are neglected consideration, these include those that werent from the bush, non-British immigrants, the Aboriginal people and women. Also the use of romanticised and exaggerated evidence causes an imbalance in his conclusions.Wards main reason for writing "The Australian Legend" was to portray the typical Australians perception of himself. He admitted that the book was not intended to be a history of Australia, and it wasnt. What the narrative does do however, is trace and explore the show prison term of what he referred to as the "national mystique". Ward bases his work on the opinion that the Australian spirit is somehow intimately connected with the bush and that it derives rather from the common folk than from the more than respectable sections of society. He treats this assumption methodically, using literary and historical evidence. The volume of the evidence, are extracts taken from the Sydney Bulletin, a paper edited by J.F Archibald. Writers included "the terce greatest nationalist writers of the nineties", as Ward called them. They were Banjo Paterson, Henry Lawson, and Joseph Furphy. Ward believed that their works were hard fact - a reflection of the emergence of a distinctively Australian itinerary of life in the come inback. This evidence however is rather selective. It appears that Ward has only chosen to include the works that support his version of the Australian identity, intentionally leav ing out works by the aforementioned writers that gave reference to anyone not fitting his description of typical, ie. women, foreigners, aboriginals and city-dwellers.The Australian bush legend, Ward believed, came to its climax in the 1880s. He mentions that it was during this time that the majority of the population were native-born, white males who enjoyed the works of writers such as Paterson and Lawson. It w... ...Although partially true in its time, the Australian bush legend fades more and more as time progresses. The Australian identity of the 1890s was not the same as it was in the 1950s, nor do we have the same self-image today, as portrayed in The Australian Legend. new-fashioned statistics show that we work longer hours and drink far less then we used to. Many more Australians go to the beach than to the bush and despite the iconic male bushman, for most men and women in Australia the beach is far more central to our identity and lives, as the majority of the populatio n lives closer to our coastal shores.The Australian Legend, in itself is an acurate portrayal and recount of one part of society, from a specific era, ie. the Australian bushman of the 1890s. Its exaggerations, however, such as the romanticism of the bush ethos by Australian writers, the sickish use of evidence, and the neglect to acknowledge the contribution to our national identity from certain sections of society, ie. aboriginal people, city-dwellers, women, and non-British immigrants, render this book to be flawed. For these reasons, it cannot be regarded as a nail down and balanced account of Australian history.