I once visited John Batman’s property in north-east Tasmania, happily in the company of a Tasmanian. The guidebook listed it as a heritage site on a public road, but the graded track along the side of a ridge had to be entered by a gate marked ‘Kingston – Private Property’. We drove several kilometres before reaching another gate. We breached this, too. On our left was a nineteenth-century stone cottage incorporated into a weatherboard homestead. On our right was a large shed and stables. A generator puttered away, and music came from the house. We shouted our presence. Only the horse in the stables responded. Clearly, we were not going to find a stall selling Batman memorabilia.
Possession: Batman’s treaty and the matter of history by Bain Attwood
Miegunyah Press, $54.99 hb, 415 pp
Shaking Hands on the Fringe: Negotiating the Aboriginal world at King George’s sound by Tiffany Shellam
University of Western Australia Publishing, $29.95 pb, 279 pp
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