Multicultural literature in Australia and the AustLit database

Did you know that among the earliest of Australia’s multicultural writers is the Spanish-born Rudesindo Salvado, whose memoir, Memorie Storiche dell'Australia, was published in Italy in 1851? Salvado’s book, though perhaps not well-known, is held in its English translation by at least fifty Australian libraries. Better known is The Eureka Stockade, published in Melbourne in 1855 by Italian-born Raffaelo Carboni, another of Australia’s multicultural writers. The AustLit database’s Australian Multicultural Writers subset (http://www.austlit.edu.au/ specialistDatasets/MW) lists more than 3 000 writers who have identified as having cultural backgrounds other than Anglo- Celtic, and whose works have been published from the early 1800s to the present day, in both English and in over fifty other languages.