ENTERING THE "INTERWAR YEARS"


The magazine scene of the 1920s is again outside the scope of my main research focus, though I must note that there is a growing wave of interest in 'Magazines and Modernity in Australasia'.

A conference is indeed taking place with that very title in Queensland later this week, with leading academic researchers such as David Carter, Roger Osborne, Elizabeth Webby and Jill Julius Matthews to the fore.

Amanda Laugesen's brief article doesn't venture into the 1920s life of Aussie other than a closing comment that it became a curious and slightly disjointed magazine, the implication being that its dedication to sustaining the digger culture was not itself sustainable.

The prevalent nature of magazine publishing in the northern hemisphere was attuned to the era of the flapper. Whether it was Old Blighty or the U.S. of A, the themes were: Happy, Happy, Sunny, Jolly.

The market was being saturated with titles such as these.