SOURCE: Wilkes, G. A. “The Eighteen Nineties.” In Australian Literary Criticism, edited by Grahame Johnston, pp. 30-40. Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1962.

In the following essay, originally published in 1958, Wilkes discusses the unique characteristics that defined Australian literature of the 1890s while commenting on major writers and works of the period.

The first duty of anyone discussing Australian literature in the nineties is, I imagine, to demonstrate the existence of his subject. In Australia's literary development, is there a period ‘the nineties’ with distinctive characteristics that can be intelligently discussed, and if so, may the writing of this period be justly described as ‘literature’? My first duty is to answer these questions, and indeed I shall make that my whole duty. I propose to explore the identity of this phase of Australian literature, and to attempt an evaluation of it in terms of the writing then produced.

Was there...