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This issue features the winning entries of the ABR Inaugural Annual Reviewing Competition, for which we received more than a hundred entries, fairly evenly spread across the three categories of fiction, non-fiction and children's books. Before I go any further I will note now that the poetry entries were few, only two in fact, one of which was a savaging of John Kinsella's poetry, so damning it is not possible to publish it. No doubt the poetry enthusiasts who complained about poetry being grouped with fiction will have more to say on the matter. Or perhaps poetry is too difficult for new and inexperienced reviewers. I welcome comment. Helen Daniel
The standard varied a lot, some easily discarded on my preliminary sorting, others competent but unexciting. But the judges reached agreement readily on the winners in each category and the results are published in full in this issue of the magazine. The judges incidentally were Jane Palfreyman (publisher at Random House), Michael Shmith (from The Age and also editor of Kobbé), Jason Steger (literary editor of The Age) and me. We had a lively discussion on what constitutes a good review and on the range of books selected for review -- mainly prominent titles from the last year or so. Non-fiction entries included reviews of Drusilla Modjeska's Stravinsky's Lunch, Henry Reynold's Why Weren't We Told?, Catherine Lumby's Gotcha, Geoffrey Robinson's The Justice Game, Gillian Bouras' Starting Again and Inga Clendinnen's Tiger's Eye (three times). Fiction entries included Kate Grenville's The Idea of Perfection, James Bradley's The Deep Field, Elliott Perlman's Three Dollars, David Malouf's Dream Stuff, Tom Petsinis' The Twelfth Dialogue (twice), Laurie Clancy's Night Parking, Julia Leigh's The Hunter and Murray Bail's Eucalyptus.
The reviews were read without any names attached to them and were almost entirely by writers unknown to me -- the single exception was by Ben Zipper, who came third in the non-fiction category with his review of Bob Ellis' And So It Goes, a reviewer known to ABR readers as a contributor to Shorts.
As for what constitutes a good review, one of the judges, Michael Shmith, commented thus:
A review has, in my mind, to contain three essential qualities: (a) a succinct summary of what the book itself is about, or what it is trying to say; (b) enough of a leavening agent -- humour, stylish writing, wry observation etc -- to make the review iteslf readable; (c) a sense of balance that, while letting the reader decide, nevertheless at least points the reader in the right direction: in other words, out of the interest generated by the review itself, is the book worth buying or not buying? Too many of the non-fiction entries simply tell the story or comment without considering the review itself as being something of an artform that can and must have its own elegance as a piece of writing that inspires or provokes.
Michael Shmith also noted that the fiction reviews represented much superior quality to the non-fiction. 'These reviews are much more assured, less didactic, and indeed tell the stories and make their comments mostly with skill and style.' Which raises the question: is fiction easier to review in a lively way than non-fiction? And further, given the calibre of the books selected for review: is it easier to review a good book in a lively way than a poor book? Obviously the poor book will attract negative comment, which can be just a form of savaging the book -- interesting enough but often cruel.
The essay in this issue is by distinguished American critic, Ihab Hassan, the author of many books on contemporary American fiction and in this essay, 'How Australian Is It?', he turns his attention to some contemporary Australian fiction. A frequent visitor to Australia, he is planning more writing on contemporary Australian fiction, which I for one am eager to read. It is the perpective of an outsider, informed but essentially that of an outsider, which I think makes for intensely interesting reading.
Your comments are invited: email them in a Letter to the Editor
Return to Australian Book Review /September 2000