Through Australian Eyes: Colonial Perceptions of Imperial Britain

In the last twenty-five years of the 19th century, around 200,000 visitors from Australia landed in Britain. As members of the colonial elite, they sailed to the Old Country to experience their Britishness: they toured Westminster Abbey; they visited graves of parents; they threw snowballs at Christmas. Yet they were also aware of themselves as Australians. In 1891, one Irishman wrote of his birthplace: 'The north of Ireland is a disgusting climate for an Australian who loves his blue skies and glorious sunshine.' Even London could disappoint: 'I have seen many curious things here not to be seen at home but it's not half the place I expected to see - hardly worth coming for.' Colonial Australians were British, but not of Britain, and their diaries and letters offer a distinctive insight into nineteenth-century Britain. Using unpublished diaries and letters, this book offers a unique and cross-disciplinary approach to Cultural History. It considers both British and Australian national identities as the products of cultural displacement.