30 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander writing
University of Queensland Press
Anita Heiss
UQFL198 – University of QLD Press Collection (605 boxes, 8 parcels)
I see boxes. Close my eyes. Breathe in the musty odour of cardboard. I focus. Hear the voices of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander writers sharing storytelling skills passed on over millennia, as faded pages carry diverse knowledges, wisdoms and experiences.
These words speak to hearts, minds, and to the nation’s soul.
Voices on yellowing paper forge a place in the Australian literary landscape, assuming the role of educator, entertainer, bridge-builder.
A golden yellow cover embraces the pioneers of Aboriginal writing in the first comprehensive anthology. It’s entitled Paperbark. It spring-boarded those enclosed into lecture theatres where words were dissected, analysed, criticised, digested and then regurgitated into essays and research papers. Paperbark began the Black Australian Writers Series (BAWS) in 1990. BAWS became the home for the books that followed; novels, memoirs, poetry, all published as a nod of respect to the man who adorns Australian currency. He was an inventor. Our first published author. His name immortalised through the David Unaipon Award, a place where poets Graeme Dixon, Jazz Money, John Muk Muk Burke, Samuel Wagan Watson and Elizabeth Hodgeson first shone.
My heart swells with excitement as Indigenous excellence wafts through UQFL198. Names like Melissa Lucashenko, Eveleyn Araluen and Ellen van Neerven represent advocacy and awards. They speak the truth for readers who want to listen, who need to hear. But these writers refuse to be boxed in.
UQFL198 represents the thousands of Aboriginal children removed under Acts of Protection that did little to protect our children. Their stories, finally heard the world over, thanks to the generosity of the late Doris Pilkington Garimara, and three girls following a rabbit proof fence home to family and country.
605 boxes contain all that Australian literature offers, but today, it’s only the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voices that I can hear.
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Links to the Fryer Library Collection
University of Queensland Press Records, UQFL198, Fryer Library, The University of Queensland.
Davis, J. (Noongar). (1990). Paperbark : a collection of Black Australian writings. University of Queensland Press.
Biography
Professor Anita Heiss (Wiradjuri Nation) is the author of 19 books across genres including commercial fiction, historical fiction, kids’ novels and non-fiction. Her most recent novel Bila Yarrudhanggalangdhuray won the 2022 NSW Premier’s Literary Award for Indigenous Writing. She is on the board of UQP.
