Discover the essential and precious freedom of Western Australia Join adventurer and photographer Jocelyn Burt as she travels through a land of astonishing contrasts from breathtaking wildflowers near Mount Magnet to the awesome grandeur of Kalmina Gorge in the Hamersley Range. Discover Western Australia offers travellers and visitors a sample of the special attractions this vast state has to offer. Produced in full colour, it is the perfect Christmas gift for interstate or overseas friends and relatives. NOW AVAILABLE FROM YOUR LOCAL BOOKSHOP RRP S2995 HARDBACK ISBN 1 875560211 University of Western Australia Press Tuart House Nedlands WA 6009 ph (09) 380 3670 fax (09) 380 1027 WESTERLY a quarterly review ISSN 0043-342x GUEST EDITORS: Harry Aveling, Beverley Hooper EDITORS: Delys Bird, Peter Cowan, Dennis Haskell EASTERN STATES EDITOR: Bruce Bennett EDITORIAL ADVISORS: Margot Luke (prose), Brenda Walker (reviews) EDITORIAL CONSULTANTS: Diana Brydon (University ofGuelph) , Yasmine Gooneratne (Macquarie University), Brian Matthews (Flinders University), Vincent 0' Sullivan (Victoria University, Wellington), Peter Porter (London), Robert Ross (University of Texas at Austin), Anna Rutherford (University of Aarhus), Andrew Taylor (Edith Cowan University), Edwin Thumboo (National University of Singapore) ADMINISTRATOR: Caroline Horobin Westerly is published quarterly at the Centre for Studies in Australian Literature in the English Department, University of Western Australia with assistance from the Commonwealth Government through the Australia Council, and the State Government of W.A. through the Department for the Arts. The opinions expressed in Westerly are those of individual contributors and not of the Editors or Editorial Advisors. Correspondence should be addressed to the Editors, Westerly, Department of English, University of Western Australia, Nedlands, Western Australia 6009 (telephone (09) 380 210 1). Unsolicited manuscripts not accompanied by a stamped self-addressed envelope will not be returned. All manuscripts must show the name and address of the sender and should be typed (double-spaced) on one side of the paper only. Whilst every care is taken of manuscripts, the editors can take no final responsibility for their return; contributors are consequently urged to retain copies of all work submitted. Minimum rates for contributors - poems $30,00; reviews $50.00; stories/articles $80.00. Subscriptions: $24.00 per annum (posted); $42.00 for 2 years (posted). Special student subscription rate: $18.00 per annum (posted). Single copies $5 (plus $1 postage). Subscriptions should be made payable to Westerly and sent to The Secretary, CSAL, Department of English, University of Western Australia, Nedlands, Western Australia 6009. Work published in Westerly is cited in: Abstracts of English Studies, Australian Literary Studies Annual Bibliography, Australian National Bibliography, Journal of Commonwealth Literature Annual Bibliography, Arts and Humanities Citation Index, Current Contents/ Arts & Humanities, The Genuine Artic/e, Modern Language Association of America Bibliography, The Year's Work in English Studies, and is indexed inAPIAS: Australian Public Affairs Information Service (produced by the National Library of Australia) and AUSTLIT, the Australian Literary On-Line Database. Three Westerly Indexes 1956-77, 1978-83 and 1984-88, are available at $5.00 each from the above address. Department for theArts lil Government or Western Australia WESTERLY, No.4, SUMMER, 1993 Editors' Notice The Editors wish to advise contributors and subscribers of some changes in organisation of the magazine. We wish to advise contributors of articles that these may now be submitted by email, addressed as follows: westerly @uniwa.uwa.edu.au; if email submission is not possible, we would prefer submission by disk. We use Microsoft Word 5.1 on Macintosh computers, but can deal with work in Microsoft Word, Word Perfect or ASCII completed on macintosh or IBM machines; please indicate on an accompanying note with programme has been used. If neither email or disk submission is possible, we ask contributors to submit two copies of each article. From the beginning of 1994 Westerly will be available for subscription by email or in the traditional hard copy form. The email subscription rate will be $10 p.a. If you wish to subscribe to this form of the magazine, please send your email number to Caroline Horobin together with your subscription payment. Each issue will be sent to you once its preparation is complete; please note that normal copyright provisions will prevail. 2 WESTERLY. No.4. SUMMER. 1993 CONTENTS WESTERLY VOLUME 38, No.4, SUMMER 1993 STORIES Music for Libretto Dewi Anggraeni 7 Mulshi Lake Joshua Wilson 39 Happy and in Love Brigid Lowry 74 Christmas Cake Chris Doran 90 My Friend Africa Shahnon Ahmad 108 POEMS Hersri Setiawan 42 Kirpal Singh 62 Leslie Fowler 43 Edwin Thumboo 77 Fay Zwicky 44 FICTO CRITICISM Aliens Bernard Cohen 33 Travelling Australia ... A Personal Journey Kirpal Singh 58 Golddiggers Sang Ye with Sue Trevaskes and Nicholas Jose 102 ARTICLES 'Crossing that little bridge into Asia .. .' Australian fiction set in Southeast Asia Koh Tai Ann 20 Australian Travel Writing about Asia in the 20s and 30s Ron Blaber 46 Charles Cooper and the Representation of the Chinese in Australian Fictions Ouyang Yu 65 Transformation of the Tourist Gaze: India in Recent Australian Fiction Graham Huggan 83 REVIEWS s. Margarey, S. Rowley & S. Sheridan (eds), 'Debutante Nation: Feminism Contests the 1980s' Delys Bird 117 Fotini Epanomitis, 'The Mule's Foal' Lucy Dougan 118 Ding Xiaoqi, 'Maidenhome' Fen Liang 120 Paul Salzman, 'Helplessly Tangled in Female Arms and Legs: Elizabeth Jolley's Fictions' Pamela Bagworth 121 David Malouf, 'Remembering Babylon' Andrew Taylor 123 E.L. Grant Watson, 'The Nun and the Bandit' Angeline O'Neill 125 Anne Kennedy, 'Musica Ficta' Veronica Brady 127 CONTRIBUTORS 131 Cover design by Susan Ellvey of Designpoint using "Ginger in Japan" a colour screenprint by Martin Sharp, 1981. Reproduced with kind permission of Martin Sharp. Printed by Lamb Printers Pty Ltd. WESTERLY, No.4, SUMMER, 1993 3 CROSSING THE WATERS EDITORIAL COMMENTS Introducing the 1991 special issue of Westerly, editors Bruce Bennett and Dennis Haskell commented that some of the magazine's special issues 'reflect the tenor of the times'. To say that this is true of the present issue would be one of the under-statements of the year. 'Asia' is not just currently fashionable in Australia - it has become a political and media obsession. Australia's expanding links with Asia have been accompanied by a wideranging debate, at times heated, about the basic nature of Australia's identity in the 1990s - and for the next century. All too often we are offered the simplistic choice of deciding whether Australia is 'part of Asia' (and even 'Asian') or whether it is currently, and will continue to be, fundamentally a 'European' society. Anyone who questions Australia's growing 'enmeshment' with Asia tends to be denounced as Eurocentric or 'Orientalist' (a la Said), while the Asia enthusiasts are accused of selling out Australia's European, and especially British, cultural heritage. An integral component of this simplistic dichotomy is the continuing notion that there is an 'Asian' identity which can be juxtaposed against an 'Australian' one. We are besieged daily by media reports about 'Asian immigration', 'business opportunities in Asia', 'Australians should learn more about Asian culture', and so on. Yet the term 'Asia' is, of course, no more than convenient shorthand for a region that has over half the world's population, hundreds of different ethnic groups, and four of the world's major cultural traditions (Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism and Islam). As John Steadman argued in his book The Myth of Asia almost twenty five years ago, the cultural and social differences within the region are often as great as those between anyone 'Asian' culture and Western Judao-Christian culture. For all of this, the Australia-Asia dichotomy - and the symbolism of "crossing the waters", "the sea wall" (as Christopher Koch wrote), or the bridge to Asia - remains a powerful concept. As this collection illustrates, there are many different 'Asias' (and 'Australias ') and many types of bridges as well as crossings and cross fertilisations. The major theme of these essays and poems is that of personal encounters: the minutiae of social and cultural interaction that challenges, but also sometimes confirms, the common stereotypes of the 'other'. Kirpal Singh and Sang Ye - the Singaporean Sikh and the PRC Chinese - encounter the "puzzling continent" of Australia, as do poets Edwin Thumboo and Hersri Setiawan. In Dewi Anggraeni's story 'Music for Libretto', the Indonesian­ Australian encounter becomes a rather more intimate one. From the other side, Chris Doran has to come to terms with his gaijin identity in Japan when encountering a classroom of twelve-year-olds and their teacher. A second theme, and one on which there is now a substantial amount of 4 WESTERLY. No.4. SUMMER. 1993 writing and commentary, is that of Australian novels and accounts of travel set in Asia. Most of the articles argue that this writing has been characterised - and continues to be characterised - by Orientalism and ethnocentrism. In her examination of Australian fiction set in southeast Asia, Koh Tai Ann raises the question of whether the Australian imagination can, in fact, "do without Asia as the exotic Other". Graham Huggan detects similar features in the representation of India in recent Australian fiction, as does Ron Blaber in his examination of Australian travel writing about Asia in the 20s and 30s. An associated theme is the representation of Chinese in Australian fiction with Ouyang Yu arguing that there is 'still a long way to go towards returning the Chinese as truly human beings to Australian fiction'. Although this Asia-Australia issue of Westerly undoubtedly reflects the tenor of the times, it is not simply part of the current 'Asia' vogue. Rather it continues a concern with Asia which has been a feature of the magazine ever since it commenced publication in 1956.