A Shelf
pp. 99-100 · Read in the full issue
Of This And That
Books of short stories and poems, a learned tome on Cyrtandra, several books for children and a couple of useful booklets on postage stamps are among the miscellaneous items to reach PI M’s reviewing de
partment recently.
OAMPLES of the work of three k-J Australian literary figures ap pear in collections this month: Stories of the Riverina by E. O. Schlunke, selected by Clement Semmler; The Big Burn, short stories by Brian James, selected by Norman Lindsay; and the Collected Poems of A D Hope.
In the case of Schlunke, this is a memorial edition, as he died in 1962.
He was a third generation Australian of German migrant stock. He was porn on the land and was a practis ing farmer until he died, as well as a part-time author of stories that ap peared in the Bulletin and elsewhere He also wrote several novels but it s by his short stories of the wheat, meep and cattle country of New >outh Wales that he will be emembered.
Brian James also has been most oncerned with country characters, ilthough more in the role of ibserver. He was brought up on a arm but became a teacher. As a eacher he began to write, mostly or his own pleasure, under the name \ B ™ n James - Hi s real name is ohn Tierney.
A D Hope is Professor of English t the Australian National University he present volume of poems is an nlarged version of an earlier eol ation published in 1960. It has
een published simultaneously in
ydney, London and New York.
(Stories Op The Riverina *9 7*
HE BIG BURN. $27 colLeSh S S-1 h 30 ; 6 1 $3 - 75 Al > P uSSe C d TE by ngus and Robertson).
T is a great help to non-scientific e , book reviewers if the publishers t learned tomes send a little en- Shtemng literature with them, in yman s language.
A case in point is Monograph of
yrtandra (Gesneriaceae) on Oahu
awauan Islands, by Harold St.’
John. This has been published as a Bernice P. Bishop Museum Bulletin and is a large work of 464 pages, innumerable illustrations, all on ex pensive art paper. It is, however, completely incomprehensible to any one except a botanist.
After careful sleuthing we have come to the conclusion that it is a most exhaustive account of a shrub that comes in 500 different species m the tropical lands around and in the Pacific Ocean but in only 118 species on Oahu.
We can only guess at the common names of the shrubs that come into the genus Cyrtandra; but a wild Plunge, after examination of the hundreds of plates, might suggest (a) croton; (b) hibiscus; (c) oleander; (d) loquat.
This book is probably of very great value and interest to botanists interested in the flora of the Pacific
area. We are sorry we can’t tell them more about it, (Published by the Bernice P. Bishop Museum. Honolulu. SUSI 2).
A MISCELLANY of information about the odd and unusual newspapers of Australia and adjoin ing islands has been gathered into a 110-page book called Pens and Ems, by an Adelaide man, Alan Finch.
The book is a sort of “Believe It Or Not”, about newspapers.
There is information about hand written newspapers, papers printed on silk and on brown paper bags, on board ships, by the services, by a troupe of dwarfs and by a handful of bored and isolated telegraph operators.
Other oddities described are the world’s smallest daily newspaper, the Torres Straits Daily Pilot (printed on a 9 in. x 16 in. sheet), and
another that solved circulation problems by fastening its sole copy to a tree for the benefit of the pass ing public.
New Guinea newspapers, including the pidgin English Nu Gini Toktok, published at Lae, are mentioned as are the predecessors of the present Norfolk Islander.
Newspapers published on islands have, in fact, the dignity of a special chapter of their own, those of Thurs day, Torrens, Kangaroo, King and Flinders Islands all being covered.
A particularly interesting chapter concerns the first newspapers to be published in each State.
(Pens And Ems. Rigby. $3.)
TWO books for children and particularly for those interested in animals, are The Story of the Platypus and The Story of a Hip popotamus, both by Alfred G.
Milotte and both delightfully illu strated by Helen Damrosch Tee-Van.
Both author and artist are Ameri can citizens. Milotte has specialised in filming wild life and has worked with Disney on four of his award winning films. He spent two years in Australia closely observing the platypus and did the research for the hippopotamus in Kenya when filming segments of Disney’s African Lion.
The artist is an expert illustrator of undersea life, animals and flowers, and has undertaken numerous ex peditions while attached to the New York Zoological Society.
Although each story has a special hero (or heroine, in one case) there is also a wealth of material about all the animals of Africa and Aus tralia. (Published by Angus and Robertson. $A1.75 each).
PACIFIC stamp collectors will be interested in two of the Pocket Book series published by Review Publications Pty. Ltd., of Sterling Street, Dubbo, NSW, at 25c each.
The Papua And New
Guinea Stamp Catalogue
is a simplified catalogue listing the postage stamps of German New Guinea and the former German North-West Pacific (taken over by Australia in 1914), and Papua and New Guinea to date. It is well illustrated and gives stamp values.
Decimal Stamps Of Aus
TRALASIA is a priced and illustrated catalogue of all the decimal definitives issued on February 14 by Australia, the Solomons, the Gilbert and Ellice Islands, Nauru, Norfolk Island and Papua-New Guinea. There is a note on when decimal currency will be issued in other South Pacific ter ritories.