Australian Writers in London: London was full of Rooms.

Australian Writers in London London was full of Rooms edited by Tulley Barnett, Nena Bierbaum, Syd Harrex, Rick Hosking and Graham Tulloch Adelaide, Lythrum Press, 2006

Of course my interest in this new book is because it contains an article on John Lang written by Rick Hosking but there are other nineteenth century writers included. Many Australian visited and lived in London in both the nineteenth century and the twentieth century. Part One of the book is devoted to the Malaysian writer Lee Kok Liang and his famous book London does not belong to me. The second half is devoted to Australians. These include Catherine Martin, Catherine Helen Spence, John Lang and Marcus Clarke. There are poems on London by Henry Lawson. and Victor Daley 

One of the interesting articles is by Peter Morton. His title is 'Polluted with Diseases and Vices of Centuries': Writers negating London 1889-1914. His writers give us a quite different view of the Centre of the great British Empire. It is a gloomy, ugly, unpleasant city a far cry from what we are usually told about the 'centre of civilization'.