ABSTRACT
Children's narratives in Australia might be said to have begun 40,000 years ago when oral telling of stories was an integral part of Aboriginal daily living. People who live tradition-oriented lives in Australia confirm that ancient stories are retold today with strict ownership customs ensuring their continuity and accuracy. Both adults and children were the intended audience for stories and for these public or ‘outside versions of the stories, there is no distinction. Collections of traditional stories do exist in both contemporary and historically significant editions, and writers and collectors have made varying degrees of effort to reproduce accurate written translations of the oral stories. Notable examples are Mary Ann Fitzgerald's King Bungarees Phyalla: Stories, Illustrative of Manners and Customs that Prevailed among Australian Aborigines (1891), Langloh Parker's Australian Legendary Tales: Folklore of the Noongahburrahs, as Told to the Piccaninnies (1896, 1978), Daisy Bates's Tales Told to Kabbarli (collected in the 1930s and retold by Barbara Ker Wilson, 1972) and Catherine H.Berndt's Land of the Rainbow Snake: Aboriginal Children's Stories and Songs from Western Arnhem Land (1977). The ‘inside stories, which are not intended for children, are not at issue here as they are secret and sacred. In the ‘Western world of contemporary Australia, it is the advent of print which begins to enable non-Aboriginal cultures of Australia to focus on Aboriginal stories which can be said to be specifically for children.
