The Australian Ugliness
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Condition remarks:
Book: Fair
Jacket: No dust jacket
Pages: Yellowed
Markings: Previous owner
Condition remarks: Condition as shown in image
What does it mean to build a nation, and why has Australia so often built it badly? First published in 1960, The Australian Ugliness is a scorching indictment of Australian visual culture, architectural taste, and the suburban mediocrity that architect and critic Robin Boyd argued had come to define the nation's built environment. Boyd coins the term Featurism — the compulsive urge to disguise, ornament, and distract rather than to design with honesty and purpose — and illustrates how this philosophy had infiltrated everything from suburban bungalows to civic buildings, producing a landscape of cheerful but hollow visual chaos. Beyond its architectural critique, this landmark work of Australian cultural commentary dissects the national psyche itself, arguing that a deep-seated cultural cringe and a fixation on novelty over substance had stunted Australia's aesthetic development. Boyd writes with a wit that is both surgical and affectionate, the prose of a man who loves his country enough to condemn it frankly. Decades after its initial publication, The Australian Ugliness endures as one of the most provocative and influential books ever written about Australian identity — and any reader who looks at a suburban streetscape afterwards will never see it quite the same way again.
Author: Robin Boyd
Format: Paperback
Genre: Australian history
Condition remarks:
Book: Fair
Jacket: No dust jacket
Pages: Yellowed
Markings: Previous owner
Condition remarks: Condition as shown in image
What does it mean to build a nation, and why has Australia so often built it badly? First published in 1960, The Australian Ugliness is a scorching indictment of Australian visual culture, architectural taste, and the suburban mediocrity that architect and critic Robin Boyd argued had come to define the nation's built environment. Boyd coins the term Featurism — the compulsive urge to disguise, ornament, and distract rather than to design with honesty and purpose — and illustrates how this philosophy had infiltrated everything from suburban bungalows to civic buildings, producing a landscape of cheerful but hollow visual chaos. Beyond its architectural critique, this landmark work of Australian cultural commentary dissects the national psyche itself, arguing that a deep-seated cultural cringe and a fixation on novelty over substance had stunted Australia's aesthetic development. Boyd writes with a wit that is both surgical and affectionate, the prose of a man who loves his country enough to condemn it frankly. Decades after its initial publication, The Australian Ugliness endures as one of the most provocative and influential books ever written about Australian identity — and any reader who looks at a suburban streetscape afterwards will never see it quite the same way again.