Resource Guides: Literature: Australian Literature

Key Databases

AUSTLIT
AustLit is a non-profit collaboration between twelve Australian Universities and the National Library of Australia. Originally produced at the Australian Defence Force Academy Library, the lead agency is currently the University of Queensland. AustLit indexes and describes Australian literature published in a range of print and electronic information sources, providing authoritative information on hundreds of thousands of creative and critical Australian literature works relating to more than 100,000 Australian authors and literary organisations. It also makes available selected critical articles and creative writing in full text. Its coverage spans 1780 to the present day.
Informit Online
Informit provides access to over 80 databases covering a wide range of subjects. Content, is sourced from publishers, associations and peak professional bodies, focuses on regional perspectives and has strong coverage of the Australian context.
MLA International Bibliography
The MLA International Bibliography provides a subject index for books and articles published on modern languages, literature, folklore, and linguistics.
Access is also provided to MLA Directory of Periodicals.
Ulrichsweb : Global Serials Directory
Ulrichsweb is the authoritative source of bibliographic and publisher information on more than 300,000 periodicals of all types–academic and scholarly journals, Open Access publications, peer-reviewed titles, popular magazines, newspapers, newsletters, and more from around the world.

Key Journals

Journal of the Association for the Study of Australian Literature : JASAL
JASAL is a fully peer-reviewed journal of scholarship on Australian Literature, published by the Association for the Study of Australian Literature (ASAL).
Australian Literary Studies
A fully refereed journal devoted to the criticism and scholarship of Australian literature, ALS are interested in scholarship which speaks to Australian literary criticism, as well as that which expands the scope of literary studies internationally.
Meanjin
Known primarily as a literary magazine, Meanjin reflects the breadth of contemporary thinking, be it on literature, other art forms, or the broader issues of the times.
Overland
Overland’s mission is to foster new, original and progressive writing exploring the relationship between politics and culture, especially literature, and to bring that work to as many people as possible. Editorially, Overland is committed to publishing underrepresented perspectives on issues rarely given space in traditional media.
Quadrant
Quadrant is Australia's leading journal of ideas, essays, literature, poetry, and historical and political debate.
Southerly
Southerly publishes a wide range of poetry and fiction, critical essays and commentaries from writers and scholars all over Australia and New Zealand.
Westerly
Since 1956, Westerly has been publishing lively fiction and poetry as well as intelligent articles. It covers literature and culture throughout the world, but maintains a special emphasis on Australia, particularly Western Australia, and the Asian region.

Additional Resources

Australian Poetry Library (APL)
Provides access to a wide range of poetic texts as well as to critical and contextual material relating to them.
To be continued ... The Australian Newspaper Fiction Database
This project has uncovered over 21,000 works of fiction, greatly expanding the record of early Australian literature. This vast new collection enables important new insights into the development of Australian literary, publishing and reading culture.
Australian Literary and Historical Texts
A full text collection of Australian fiction, poetry, plays and non-fictional works, covering early Australia [to c.1920] from the University of Sydney SETIS project.
Colonial Australian Popular Fiction: a digital archive
Colonial Australian Popular Fiction is an online bibliography and digital archive that gathers together for the first time a wide range of vibrant colonial writing that has previously been difficult to access. It makes available a wide selection of popular colonial publications, many of which are now rare and out of print.
Project Gutenberg Library of Australiana
Database of old texts by Australian writers, or books about Australia. Includes the fiction of 'Banjo' Paterson, Henry Lawson and many other Australian writers.