The shifting weather: affinity, diversity, and the place of the author in six novels of the Depression era

Tn an analysis of six novels this dissertation looks at the way four authors reacted creatively to the challenge presented by the Great Depression and World War II. The features that these works have in common are numerous and significant from a literary viewpoint, and reflect their common genesis. Regardless of their affinities, however, we can appreciate that diversity of style and presentation which is to be expected from individual authors as a result of their personal and unique points of view. Furthermore, when we penetrate their surface preoccupation with social matters, and when we read these works from a perspective of world literature, as well as Australian literature, we find qualities of literariness and language that have largely gone unrecognised by critics of these novels.