W. H. Wilde

The second edition of The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature is one of my most treasured possessions. It really is a fantastic, comprehensive, insightful, and sometimes surprisingly detailed trove of Australian writing from 1788 to 1993. (There is a companion volume examining children's lit.) Healthy biographies of writers, philosophers, poets, explorers, and more are complemented by histories of newspapers and journals, summaries of notable novels and short stories, and a range of engaging entries on all related subjects.

This edition is now online too (a National Library membership will get you there). A 3rd edition doesn't appear to have emerged, which is a shame, as Australian lit has diversified in a glorious cavalcade of ways over the last 25 years. However that also is a blessing in disguise. By 1994, certainly "OzLit" was reaching a new peak, but we hadn't quite yet seen the incredible efflorescence of genres, voices, and of course alternative methods of publishing that have occurred in my lifetime. As a result, for someone like me whose interest is primarily on the history of Australian literature, this truly is the best one-volume edition to provide a rich overview of how we got to the present day.… (més)