lamdha books -
Catalogue of books on Aboriginal Australia

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205069 Barwick, Diane, et al. (eds.) Aboriginal History Volume Two, 1-2, 1978 Australian National University, Canberra ACT, 1978. Octavo; paperback; 188pp., with many monochrome illustrations. Mild wear; covers lightly rubbed and edgeworn; sunned along the spine. Very good. Texts by Jeremy Beckett, Diane Bell, Henry Reynolds and Francesca Merlan. Click here to order $20

72528 Brodsky, Isadore Bennelong Profile: signed copy Dreamtime Reveries of a Native of Sydney Cove University Co-Operative Bookshop Ltd., Broadway, Sydney, NSW, Australia, 1973. Octavo; full calf binding with gilt spine and upper board titles, embossed gilt upper board decoration, and decorated endpapers; 95pp., on untrimmed laid paper with decorations, with 12 monochrome plates on glossy pink paper. Signed and numbered in red ink by the author on the title page; minor spotting to the text block top edge. Gold-printed mylar dustwrapper with a few scattered spots in near fine condition. Near fine. Click here to order $25

202099 Charlesworth, Max, et al. (eds.) Religion in Aboriginal Australia An anthology University of Queensland Press, St. Lucia Qld., 1989. Octavo; paperback; 458pp., with maps and monochrome illustrations. Minor wear; text block, page edges and inside covers, well toned. Very good. Click here to order $20

217025 Davis, Jack The First-born and Other Poems: signed J.M. Dent, Melbourne, 1983. Octavo hardcover; black boards with gilt spine titling; 51pp., b&w illustrations. Signed in ink on the front endpaper by the author. Toning to text block edges with a few scattered spots; on or two small marks on front endpaper; mild rubbing to black illustrated dustwrapper with a tiny scrape on lower front corner; now professionally protected by superior non-adhesive polypropylene film. Very good. Click here to order $50

90086 Hale, Monty (Minyjun) Kurlumarniny We come from the desert Aboriginal Studies Press/AIATSIS, Canberra ACT, 2012. Quarto; paperback; 230pp., with maps and many monochrome illustrations. Mild wear. Very good. "Monty Hale's (Minyjun) autobiography is a vibrant account of a fascinating period of Western Australian history. Monty recounts the story of his parents and other Nyangumarta people walking hundreds of kilometres from the Western Desert to the coast in the nineteen thirties, and meeting white people for the first time. He also paints a rich account of Aboriginal people's experience of station life in the forties and fifties, including 'their right to a fair wage', the Pilbara strike, and mining for tin to buy land. It is a history of co-existence told through poignant personal stories. This book is a rich contribution to historical accounts of Western Australia's social, cultural and economic history. Kurlumarniny is written in both English and Nyangumarta so is an important contribution to acknowledging and maintaining Aboriginal languages." - Dr Kathryn Trees Click here to order $28

205515 Knox, Kelvin, & Eugene Stockton (eds.) Aboriginal Heritage of the Blue Mountains Recent Research and Reflections Blue Mountains Education and Research Trust, Lawson NSW, 2019. Quarto; paperback; 256pp., with maps and many monochrome and full-colour illustrations. New. People have inhabited Australia for thousands of years. At the foot of the Blue Mountains, New South Wales, human occupation is dated at up to 50,000 years ago. In 1788, the way of life for Aboriginal people living in the Mountains irrevocably changed. However, their cultural heritage, handed down from ancient generations, has remained in the form of occupation sites, art, artefacts, axe-grinding grooves, scarred trees, stone arrangements and other physical traces of their presence in the landscape. "Aboriginal Heritage of the Blue Mountains" gathers together some new research, stories and reflections about the Mountains' Aboriginal inhabitants and their heritage, perhaps what could now be understood as Australia's shared heritage. Click here to order $50

217375 Lewis, Megan Conversations with the Mob University of Western Australia Press, 2008. Landscape quarto hardcover; black boards with silver gilt spine titling, black endpapers; 239pp., colour plates. A few scattered spots on upper text block edges. Otherwise near fine in like dustwrapper now professionally protected by superior non-adhesive polypropylene film. Conversations with the Mob is an intimate photographic portrayal of the Martu Aboriginal people, one of the last Indigenous groups in Australia's Great Sandy Desert to come into contact with Europeans. When the Mob allowed a whitefella - photojournalist Megan Lewis - to come and live with them, the understanding was she was there to take photographs to share with outsiders. But as two and a half years passed and Megan absorbed herself in the Mob's way, it became apparent that the project was more than a book or an exhibition - it was a journey of marpan (healing) for whitefellas and Martu alike. "Your photos are making Martu look at themselves and think, what are we doing... Now I see why you have to do this, because Martu have to look at themselves." Conversations with the Mob captures the reality of a traditional people living neither in their old world or in a white world. Through photographs, oral stories and Megan's own experiences with the Mob, the reader enters the reality of desert life where health, grief, footy, humour, sorry business and spirits consume daily survival. Click here to order $40

90226 Lowe, Pat & Jimmy Pike Jilji: Life in the Great Sandy Desert - signed by Pat Lowe Magabala Books, Broome WA, 1990. Quarto; hardcover, with white upper board titling and decorated endpapers; 147pp., with many colour illustrations. Minor wear; institution stamp on half-title page and presentation date handwritten on the title page; mild wear to board edges and corners. One or two tiny scrapes on the dustwrapper edges; now professionally protected by superior non-adhesive polypropylene film. Very good to near fine. This book describes some of the features of life in the desert as told or shown by people who once lived here. Where there has been no real change, the present tense is used; for accuracy, however, when life is described as it was lived by nomadic bands before they settled, the past is used. The desert language in the text is Walmajarri. Click here to order $45

218035 Strehlow, T.G.H. (ed. Rev. P.A. Scherer) Book of Liturgical Worship for Lutheran Congregations in the Aranda Language of Central Australia Finke River Mission of the United Evangelical Lutheran Church in Australia, Tanunda, 1958. Quarto hardcover; quarter bound brown decorated boards with cloth spine panel, untitled on covers; 92pp., 1-6 pp., foreword by Rev. P.A. Scherer - otherwise written entirely in the Aranda language, musical scores and a few b&w illustrations. Minor wear; rubbing to boards with a few small scrapes; well-rubbed spine panel and light wear to cover edges, creasing at upper front corner; toned text block and page edges; initials on front endpaper in pencil. Otherwise very good. Click here to order $200

90075 Sykes, Roberta Snake Dreaming Trilogy - signed by the author "Snake Cradle", "Snake Dancing", & "Snake Circle" Allen & Unwin Pty. Ltd., St. Leonards NSW, 1997-2000. Three volumes: octavo; paperback; 1255pp. [330pp. + 270pp.+ 325pp.], with monochrome illustrations. Minor wear; scuffing to the covers; text block edges spotted; signed in ink on the first two title pages; previous owner's ink inscription to the first page of volumes 1 and 2. Very good. "The flamboyant Aboriginal rights activist, academic and writer, whose searing autobiography laid bare racism in Australia and provoked debate over what it meant to be an Aborigine, died on Sunday. She was 67. Dr Sykes spent much of her adult years in the glare of publicity. From being arrested in 1972 at the Aboriginal tent embassy in Canberra, to being the first black Australian to graduate from a US university - namely, the ivied halls of Harvard - and the unresolved controversy over her entitlement to call herself Aborigine, she both polarised and compelled." - Jamie Walker & Andrew Fraser Click here to order $45

78588 Wongar, B. The Trackers Outback Press, Collingwood, 1975. First edition. Hardcover, octavo, 135pp. Minor wear; rear panel of dustwrapper rubbed and small bump on lower front board and dustwrapper. Very good to near fine and professionally protected by superior non-adhesive polypropylene film. An Asian architect dreams of building a bridge linking the two continents of Australia and Asia. But his hopes of creating racial harmony are suddenly shattered. One morning he discovers his skin has turned black; overnight, he is forced to become a fugitive. During his flight to freedom the Asian discovers the Aboriginal people. He is accepted as a brother, and quickly embraces aboriginal culture, lifestyles and legends. His experiences become our window into the lives of the indigenous population who inhabit the vast, tyrannical Australian outback. A compelling story, magically written. Click here to order $18