BIG SKY - DUALING IDEAS

It was purchased new prior to picking up a scrappy old copy of Dark Emu in a country secondhand bookshop. Big Sky was a subsequent book written by Bruce Pascoe, so Dark Emu was read first. One has to admit not being terribly enthused about reading these books, such is the reputation of indigenous gripes, but one remained curious enough to want to; and was eventually pleased that these publications had been read.

Dark Emu had been reprinted several times, so it must have had some desirable qualities; it had won awards too. Indeed, the book turned out to be a good, informative read. It was well structured, well written, and well researched. It had none of the hype that one feared, that bold, nagging claim for attention and rights. Pascoe presented a solid case for his thesis, that Aborigines were not meandering hunter gathers with no fixed settlements, suggesting no rights to place, backing up this idea with texts from the early explorers' and settlers' diaries and writings, along with archaeological and historical evidence. One finished the book with a whole new vision of Aboriginal Australia that turned previous understandings into poor, dumb, political cliches: the argument was persuasive, so one was keen to read more.

Strangely, Big Sky shared its authorship, with Professor Ray Norris being the co-writer. One was puzzled; why two authors? Was Pascoe's first draft just too short; or perhaps not sufficiently 'learned'? It seemed odd to have the title 'Professor' on the cover. Why? It looked as though the publishers might have been hesitant about this, using a finer lettering for this word than that used for the bolder names, as if the inclusion of this title was thought inappropriate, with the letters reading faintly, fading into their black background with an optical fuzz: but they were there. Might this naming be an attempt to give the book some stature; some 'academic' standing; some 'real' substance?#

Did this ‘professor’ title get promoted for what might be the same reasons as Debra Dank declared herself as ‘Dr’ - PhD – in Terraglossia, seeming to want to add some semblance of intellectual depth to an unfamiliar subject? – see: https://voussoirs.blogspot.com/2025/12/terraglossia-first-nations-experience.html. One wondered . . . why? Why the title? Why two authors? How did two people collaborate to give one text?

This latter uncertainty was soon resolved: each author has the various portions of the book written by them identified by their name 'Bruce' or 'Ray.' There was no sense of a conversation here. Each author appeared to press on with his own particular approach to the subject. Was the intention to present the ‘naive,’ perhaps more intuitive indigenous view in parallel with that of the 'professor's 'scientific' approach? The cut-and-paste structure of the book made one wonder about this editorial decision that seemed to have nothing to do with such an aligned strategy, no matter how one might interpret it. Was this subsequent book, that looked to be nicely named to match the titles of the previous books - Dark Emu and Emu Dreaming# - so as to perhaps to help the purchaser's recall, a mere potboiler cashing in on the other successes?

As one read the book, there seemed to be no systematic connection between the two texts other than that they were interspersed in a somewhat ad hoc manner, with themes hopscotching along leapfrogging each other almost in spite of the other's writing.

It all appeared strange, making the subject look as though it was too big, too uncertain, or too amorphous to articulate clearly. Both texts seemed anecdotal, making very broad and general statements that seemed to lack depth, certainty, and commitment. The rigorous referencing of the Dark Emu argument was not there. One was given a scattering of statements about how this is or that was the belief of that or this group, all without reaching any resolution. The text sometimes read like a shopping list. The thoughts and statements just tumbled on and on, and on again, from one author to the next.

One could understand and accept that various stories held special spiritual characteristics that meant that they could only be told by certain groups or individuals, but this statement became a little frustrating for one attempting to understand exactly what the point of the book might be other than that Aboriginals knew the sky intimately, and used it in various ways, differently, with their own stories and context.

The book seemed to ramble on, sometimes tackling interesting threads that were allowed to fade out, to morph into other interesting distracting thoughts and ideas that did likewise without any resolution. Even the summing ups at the end of the book - each author had his own - seemed indefinite. It looked as though the authors might not have agreed on a common strategy, making this schizophrenic approach something of an editorial compromise. The book would have benefited from the determination displayed in Dark Emu, that sustained a casual rigour, for the subject of Big Sky is just as potentially intriguing and enlightening.

One is left with a hazy understanding that needs clarification in a better organised publication that has a singular intent. The dual approach turns the publication into a tangle that needs sorting out. It is a strategy that is complicated by the personal approach each brings to the texts, that further divides the writing. One is left confirming the first thought, that this book is a potboiler - an interesting potboiler, but a potboiler none the less: a broad, introductory sketch of an engaging subject potentially as transformative as the previous thesis; an outline for a good book yet to come.

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Ray Norris is an astrophysicist and science communicator, based at the CSIRO Australia Telescope National Facility, and Western Sydney University, and conducts research in astrophysics and Aboriginal Astronomy. He co-wrote Emu Dreaming: An Introduction to Aboriginal Astronomy, (published July, 2009), with Cilla Norris. There was no ‘professor’ title used on this book. At the time of its publication, he was serving as an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Indigenous Studies (Warawara) at Macquarie University.