‘Is Boggabilla where Bill takes a dump?’ Writing an Australian literary regionalism: Stories and poetry published in Idiom 23 literary magazine, 2016–2018

Abstract

This article aims to explore the representation of what I argue identifies an Australian literary regionalism in stories and poetry published in Idiom 23, Central Queensland University’s literary magazine, over the past three issues, 2016–2018. As editor of Idiom 23 during this time, I have detected in the contemporary writing of regional contributors a heightening interest in expressing a unique sense of place and history through literary elements including, but not limited to, an emphasis on local colour and characterisation, rurality and regional settings, and personal stories of time and place, as well as an idiomatic interest in literary tropes accentuating colloquialisms, regional traditions, dialogic ‘play’, personal and familial histories, Indigenous identity, and distinctive ways of mapping, representing, articulating, and celebrating cultural belonging. Exploring how contributions to Central Queensland University’s Idiom 23 literary magazine over the past three issues, 2016–2018, construct a sense of regionalism and regional identity offers rich potential to not only identify the narratives, stories, or voices ‘naturally’ arising in regional writing practices, but also how perceptions of regionality impact on the ways regional writing is itself expressed through a unique form of Australian literary regionalism.