The new Oz lit - superficial, politically correct tomes

If Herbert and White’s output were akin to Mahler symphonies, then today’s Australian novels are generally in the category of muzak. Take Tim Winton’s Cloudstreet. It is lauded by critics and readers, but why? It simply isn’t great literature, but a lightweight comedy celebrating ordinariness. It has no deeper meaning than that. And for this reason, it will be consigned to the dustbin of literary history in the not-too-distant future.

As will most Australian literature published these days. That’s because the authors generally have no grounding in classical education. They are slaves to intellectual fashion. They do not immerse themselves, in the main, in classical music, great visual art or even great literature. They do not study the philosophical movements that have made our world.

Instead they attend courses on feminist theory, structuralism and creative writing - as though the latter can ever be taught.

This is partly the fault of governments and our education system, but also of a generation that does not believe it important to establish for itself an intellectual framework within which to operate.

This is a generation of Australian authors that do not, unlike Herbert and White, seek answers to metaphysical questions.

What a pity that great Australian literature has succumbed to the level of mediocrity. That no individual will write big, sweeping and grand novels anymore. That literary muzak populates our bookshelves. And that book publishers spend all day hyping “the next big thing”, as they swan around writer’s festivals with their favourite groovy young author in tow.

Meanwhile, the Australian literary scene is a wasteland. A testament to a belief that ordinariness and mediocrity ought to be celebrated. That long epics such as Poor Fellow My Country and The Tree of Man are too time-consuming for the modern reader, and in any event they wouldn’t get it anyway because both books require some understanding of the essence of man.

It’s all very depressing.