Bleeding battlers from Ironbark : Australian myths in fiction & film, 1890s-1980s

The aim of this book is not to proclaim my interpretations as some form of higher truth to which all readers must assent as though it were infallible dogma. My aim is to disturb readers and to provoke them to counter-thought. All readers are potential commentators: they are not or should not consent to be, passive consumers of fiction and film. Commentators must react spontaneously with their whole personality to works of art. This is the only way to ensure that their comments will be creative, provocative, entertaining, emotionally rich and above all, honest. Comments on fiction and film are not scientific and should not pretend to be. There is no single correct interpretation of a work of art: there are many conflicting interpretations about which we can happily and meaningfully dispute. If these disputes are unpretentious, unladen with jargon, imaginative and lively, they will create a forum in which the art of a nation can find truly popular resonance.