"Beautiful Lies: Australia from Menzies to Howard" by Tony Griffith. [review]

Abstract

"Contemporary Australia" was the pedestrian title of a 1977 book by historian Tony Griffith. For later editions he spiced it up with a quote from Mark Twain: Australian history ‘is almost always picturesque … it does not read like history, but like the most beautiful lies’. The third edition, just out, with a new, up-to-date subtitle, is "Beautiful Lies: Australia from Menzies to Howard".