- Title
- Vue de Sydney 1840
- Creator
- Ramsland, John; Djenidi, Valerie
- Relation
- Journal of Australian Studies Issue 88, p. 83-95
- Relation
- http://www.api-network.com/scgi-bin/jas/jas.cgi
- Publisher
- Curtin University of Technology, Australia Research Institute / API Network
- Resource Type
- journal article
- Date
- 2006
- Description
- The published document that is translated here for the first time from the original French appeared in a popular nineteenth-century French journal Musée des Familles: Lectures du Soir [Museum of the families-Evening Readings] in its annual for 1840-1841 under the title of 'Etudes de Voyages-Go-roo-bor-roo-boo-lo' ['Studies of Travels-Go-roo-bor-roo-boo-lo'] by S Henry Berthoud, who was apparently an unrenowned or hack French journalist and popular writer of the period. The work was directed at a popular audience in the form of an adventure short story which was used as an educational tool to present a version of contemporary history of the South Pacific to readers. Providing, as it does, a vividly interesting description of Sydney from a French perspective, it demonstrates how British imperial history could be widely viewed in France in the mid-nineteenth century. While it contains several factual erors - some deliberate, because of the use of the fictional form - it still manages to convey effectively and succinctly the notion of a penal settlement being transformed into the capital of an articulated and complex European colony. Indeed, the author views Sydney as an idealised modern European city. More disturbing, however, are the blatant misinterpretations of Aboriginal society and culture, which deliberately promote through myth-making a persuasive sense of the racial superiority prevalent in contanporary European society. A bleak, atavistic view of Aboriginal culture is presented, particularly through the melodrama of the character Daniel's reversion to a supposed earlier type. With such issues in mind a reading of the document in translation is now invited.
- Subject
- Sydney; French view; hack journalist; popular writer; Musée des Familles: Lectures du Soir; nineteenth century
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/34888
- Identifier
- uon:3758
- Identifier
- ISSN:1444-3058
- Language
- eng
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