Skip to content

Patrick White Catalogue

"For me, a comma is a piece of sculpture.”

  • Patrick White Novels
    • Happy Valley
    • The Living and the Dead
    • The Aunt’s Story
    • The Tree of Man
    • Voss
      • Voss: the Opera
      • Voss: A film that never was
    • Riders in the Chariot
    • The Solid Mandala
    • The Vivisector
    • The Eye of the Storm
    • A Fringe of Leaves
    • The Twyborn Affair
    • The Hanging Garden
    • Memoirs of Many in One
  • Works
    • Published Works by Patrick White
    • Plays by Patrick White
      • Early plays
      • The Ham Funeral
      • The Season at Sarsaparilla
      • A Cheery Soul
      • Night on Bald Mountain
      • Big Toys
      • Signal Driver
      • Netherwood
      • Shepherd on the Rocks
    • The Night The Prowler
    • Short Stories by Patrick White
      • The Burnt Ones
      • The Cockatoos
      • Three Uneasy Pieces
      • Uncollected Stories by Patrick White
    • Poems by Patrick White
    • Essays by Patrick White
    • Flaws in the Glass
    • Letters by Patrick White
    • Music and Patrick White
    • Speeches by Patrick White
    • Patrick White Collections and Anthologies
    • Patrick White Interviews
    • Unpublished works by Patrick White
    • Other Works by Patrick White
  • About the Author
    • Patrick White Timeline
    • Patrick White Biography
    • Patrick White Quotes
    • Patrick White’s people and pets
    • Awards
    • Notes on Style
    • The White Legacy
    • White’s Reading
    • Patrick White and Art
    • The List by Patrick White
  • Miscellanea
    • The Marr Biography
    • Patrick White Bibliography
    • Patrick White Press Gallery
    • White in Parliament
    • More Aussie authors
  • Contact
    • FAQs
    • Credits
    • Terms and Conditions
  • Home
  • Patrick White’s Reading

Patrick White’s Reading

Patrick White’s Reading

Desmond Digby, Romantic Landscape (1958)

Works that were noted for having a particular impact, with thanks to David Marr’s biography, Patrick White’s letters, and miscellaneous additional sources.


1910s: Ethel Pedley’s Dot and the Kangaroo; Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden; Johann David Wyss’ The Swiss Family Robinson

1920s: James Elroy Flecker’s Hassan; Thomas Hardy’s general oeuvre; Anita Loos’ Gentlemen Prefer Blondes: The Intimate Diary of a Professional Lady; Margaret Kennedy’s The Constant Nymph; the plays of Anton Chekhov and Henrik Ibsen

1930s: Henry Handel Richardson’s The Fortunes of Richard Mahon; poetry of A.E. Housman; the works of James Joyce (especially Ulysses) and D.H. Lawrence; Gustave Flaubert’s works, especially Madame Bovary; Alain-Fournier’s Le Grand Meaulnes; George Moore’s Evelyn Innes and Sister Teresa; the works of Gertrude Stein and Oswald Spengler; Marcel Proust; Tolstoy and Dostoevsky.

1940s: Journal of Edward John Eyre; works of Charles Dickens; Cyril Connolly’s The Unquiet Grave; Eve Langley’s The Pea Pickers; Saul Bellow and John Updike.

1950s: Rimbaud’s poems; Lawrence Durrell’s Bitter Lemons; Rebecca West’s The Fountain Overflows.

1960s: Manning Clark’s History of Australia; Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov; Christina Stead’s The Man Who Loved Children; David Campbell’s poems; Jung’s Psychology and Alchemy, David Ireland’s The Chantic Bird; works of Barbara Baynton; Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita; Peter Mathers’ Trap; Elizabeth Harrower’s The Watch Tower; Janet Frame’s Owls Do Cry and other works; Boris Pasternak’s Doctor Zhivago; Ramparts Magazine: A Vietnam Primer

1970s: Edna O’Brien’s A Pagan Place; Tanizaki Jun-ichiro’s Some Prefer Nettles; Christina Stead’s Letty Fox: Her Luck; Nadine Gordimer’s The Conservationist; Shirley Hazzard’s Transit of Venus; Margaret Atwood’s The Edible Woman and other early novels; David Malouf’s Johnno and An Imaginary Life; Yasunari Kawabata’s The Sound of the Mountain; David Foster’s The Pure Land and other early works; Joseph Conrad’s Nostromo; Edmund Wilson’s works.

1980s: Janet Frame’s To the Is-Land and An Angel at My Table; Kate Grenville’s Joan Makes History; David Malouf’s novels and short stories.

Confused? Keen to use some of my content? Check out my Terms and Conditions.

  • Patrick White Novels
  • Works
  • About the Author
  • Miscellanea
  • Contact

Copyright © 2025 Patrick White Catalogue.

Theme: Oceanly by ScriptsTown