Jacket 16 - Introduction to Overland magazine supplement

Founded in 1954, overland is one of Australia’s long-standing literary/cultural magazines. It continues to be the best Australian cultural magazine on and of the left, and has an ongoing engagement with the important literary, cultural and political issues in contemporary Australia. overland has, throughout its history, remained committed to a broad left standpoint. It has published writing by many prominent Australian authors, from Patrick White to Mudrooroo, from Christos Tsiolkas to Dorothy Hewett.
      overland’s historical role has often been to give a voice to the experiences that are excluded from the mainstream media and publishing outlets. In its 47 years, the magazine has been part of an ongoing attempt to construct an alternative public sphere in which political, cultural and literary discussion and debates occur freely and which are of interest to readers alienated from narrowly academic, elite or ‘festival’ cultures. It has also been a magazine of dissent irrespective of the political leanings of the parties in power. overland has always been an enthusiastic publisher of poetry and has often given poets their first opportunity to appear in print.
      John Tranter invited overland to contribute to a joint issue with Jacket. It is a great opportunity to introduce the magazine to an international audience. Pam Brown, overland’s poetry editor since 1997, compiled this selection. A condensed print version of the feature is available for sale as a supplement to the March 2002 issue of overland. The magazine can be contacted at the following web address:
      http://www.overlandexpress.org/

Photo of Pam Brown

Pam Brown’s twelfth collection of poems, 50—50, was published by Little Esther Books in 1997. Vagabond Press produced a chapbook of her recent work titled Drifting topoi in 2001.A new collection, Text thing, is due from Paper Bark Press in 2002. She is the current poetry editor for overland magazine.

overland magazine feature

Introduction