Trafficking Literature: Travel, Modernity, and the Middle Ground of Canadian and Australian Middlebrow Print Cultures

Abstract

This article explores the possibility of renewing the comparative study of Canadian and Australian literatures through an alertness to parallel developments in mid-range magazines and middlebrow print cultures in Canada and Australia in the early- to mid-twentieth century. While scoping the possibilities of full-fledged comparative studies, its focus is a case study of the Australian magazine BP: a well-capitalized, plush upmarket publication published by the Australian steamship company Burns Philp. The BP Magazine promoted travel between 1928 and 1942 as the nation underwent a transition from settler colonialism to vernacular modernity. The magazine lays bare tensions between literary aspiration and commodity culture, sophistication and escapism, edification and entertainment, and modernity and primitiveness. The aim of this case study is to raise questions that might be asked of both national literary cultures about the role of travel, modern consumer culture, magazines, and nationhood as the scales of literary values changed during the development of local middlebrow values and tastes.

Vance and Nettie Palmer in Caloundra, 1925–29

“…These magazines and their readership were relatively sophisticated, 'globally engaged; vibrantly modern and modernising', navigating emerging technologies and media. 33 But it was Australian daily newspapers such as the Daily Mail, the Sunday Mail, the Australasian, the Courier, The Argus and the Sydney Morning Herald that provided the platform for the Palmers' initial writing about the region. By the time the Palmers left Caloundra, Nettie was regularly writing unsigned leaders for the Saturday Telegraph newspaper in Brisbane.…”

Making Friends of the Nations: Australian Interwar Magazines and Middlebrow Orientalism in the Pacific

“…An early survey of Australian magazines by Frank Greenop emphasises the "quality" of The BP Magazine, drawing attention to its status as "a magazine of excellent standard and popularity" (1947: 248). BP Magazine's status as a quality, middlebrow publication with high production values has been discussed by Kuttainen in earlier publications (2013,;2014).…”