What ifs and idle daydreaming
The creative processes of Andrew McGahan
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1017/qre.2016.7Keywords:
Andrew McGahan, interview, critiques of society, sense of place and space, 'idle daydreaming'Abstract
Andrew McGahan is one of Queensland’s most successful novelists. Over the past 23 years, he has published six adult novels and three novels in his Ship Kings series for young adults. McGahan’s debut novel, Praise (1992), won the Vogel National Literary Award for an unpublished manuscript, Last Drinks (2000) won the Ned Kelly Award for Crime Writing, and The White Earth went on to win the Miles Franklin Literary Award, The Age Book of the Year Award and the Courier-Mail Book of the Year Award, and was shortlisted for the Queensland Premier’s Literary Awards. In 2009, Wonders of a Godless World earned McGahan the Best Science Fiction Novel in the Aurealis Awards for Excellence in Australian Speculative Fiction. McGahan’s unashamedly open critiques of Australian, and specifically Queensland, society have imbued his works with a sense of place and space that is a unique trait of his writing. In this interview, McGahan allows us a brief visit into the mind of one of Australia’s pre-eminent contemporary authors, shedding light on the ‘what ifs’ and ‘idle daydreaming’ that have pushed his ideas from periphery to page.
References
Bolt A. 2008. ‘Australian novelist makes unhinged propaganda’. Herald Sun, 26 October.
Brooks K. 1998. ‘Shit Creek: Suburbia, abjection and subjectivity in Australian “grunge” fiction’. Australian Literary Studies 18(4): 87–100.
Dolin K. 2014. ‘Place and property in post-Mabo fiction by Dorothy Hewett, Alex Miller and Andrew McGahan’. JASAL 14(3): 1–12.
Gelder K. and Salzman P. 2009. After the celebration: Australian fiction: 1989–2007. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press.
McGahan A. 1992. Praise. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
McGahan A. 1995. 1988. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
McGahan A. 2000. Last Drinks. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
McGahan A. 2004. The White Earth. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
McGahan A. 2006. Underground. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
McGahan A. 2009. Wonders of a Godless World. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
McGahan A. 2011. The Coming of the Whirlpool. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
McGahan A. 2012. The Voyage of the Unquiet Ice. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
McGahan A. 2014. The War of the Four Isles. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
Merrilees M. 2007. ‘Circling with ghosts: The search for redemption’. JASAL 0(0) (Special issue): 65–76.
Muller V. 1997. ‘Waiting for Gordon: Grunge realism and Andrew McGahan’s Praise’. In L. Finch and C. McConville (eds), Images of the urban. Sippy Downs: Sunshine Coast University.
Murrie L. 2009. ‘Changing masculinities: Disruption and anxiety in contemporary Australian writing. Journal of Australian Studies, 22(56): 169–79.
Nikro N. S. 2013. ‘Pitching ethical resonance: Andrew McGahan’s The white earth’. JASAL 13(3): 1–15.
Rundle G. 2007. ‘Goodbye to all that: Beyond the limits of Australian left liberalism’. Arena Magazine, 88 (April–May): 40–6.
Strong V. 2000. ‘Not so black and white: The effects of Aboriginal law on Australian legislation’. In A. Abramson and D. Theodossopoulos (eds), Land, law and environment: Mythical land, legal boundaries. London: Pluto Press.
Vernay J.-F. 2007. ‘Sex in the city: Sexual predation in contemporary Australian grunge fiction’.Journal of the Australasian University of Modern Language Association 107: 145–58.
Wear R. 2006. ‘Writing political biography’, in J. Nethercote, T. Arklay & J. Wanna (eds), Australian political lives: Chronicling careers and administrative histories. Canberra: ANU Press.
Williams P. 2013. ‘Will this be the last drinks for Beattie?’ Courier-Mail, 13 August.
