Three-quarters of the Australian continent is arid or semi-arid. History has shown that man{u2019}s utilisation of arid lands has, in general, caused progressive deterioration of the natural vegetation, the animal resources, and finally the landscape itself. Already settlement in Australia{u2019}s arid lands bears all too evident witness to damage and degradation. Each additional use of these lands - for grazing, farming, mining - tends to distort the extremely delicate ecological balance of most of Australia.

In Japan the Heian period (A.D. 794 to 1185) was characterised by a great volume of published works of literature written by women - an event brought about by the coincidence of the development of a Japanese script at a time when women were enjoying a freedom unparalleled till the present and when the country was at peace. One of the most popular forms adopted was the nikki, a diary form which women turned into a masterful combination of poetry and prose.

This book looks at 'the Aboriginal problem' from an unusual viewpoint - that of the Aborigines themselves, for whom 'the Aboriginal problem is the white Australian'. The essays deal with all those features of traditional Aboriginal life that made it so deeply satisfying to the original Australians: religion, attachment to land, imaginative culture, and the whole ethos on which the impact of Europeans and their way of life has been destructive. The Aborigines have been dispossessed, exploited, rejected and on occasions reviled.

Despite the quantity of official and academic studies generated by the postwar immigration program, little publicity has been given to Australia's gain of highly skilled workers. This book has been written to fill out our knowledge in this area. Until recently, Australia experienced shortages of professional man power, and both government and private employers looked abroad for it. But professional skills are not as easily transferred across the globe as are lesser skills.

In 1856, at the age of six, Samuel Shumack came to the Duntroon Estate in Canberra. He farmed in the district until 1915. Forced by injury to retire from active farming, Shumack, at the age of 59, began to record his memories of old Canberra. He was an acute and accurate observer. His stories move freely from one episode to the next. The text is enhanced by eight colour plates by artist Gray Smith. This fascinating book will be treasured by all who have an interest in Canberra's history. Chap.

The German Revolution and its aftermath, the period of the Workers' and Soldiers' Councils, was a critical time in German history. Historians have asked whether the revolution could have changed the then existing inequalities. If so, it might have formed a basis for reconstruction which in turn would have arrested the deep division in the German labour movement, a major factor crippling Weimar Germany which contributed to the rise of Nazism.

Michael Terry's autobiography is the story of a hard, adventurous life, much of it in northern and central Australian deserts. Born in 1899, Terry fought as a mechanic in World War 1 in a British armoured car brigade in a little known action in Russia. Gassed, he was invalided out and came to Western Australia in 1919 where, on a cattle station near Carnarvon, he discovered his love for the outback. After a spell as a car salesman in Sydney and as a pioneer truckie in northern NSW, he drove a 10-year-old T-model Ford from Winton, Queensland to Broome, WA, much of it across trackless country.