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Queensland in Europe

By JOL Admin | 8 January 2010

Queensland can turn up in the most unexpected places...

Recently I read a short story titled The Aleph (1949) by the Argentinian writer, and librarian, Jorge Luis BorgesIn this enchanting tale, which takes its name from a mystical object that is reported to be "one of the points of space that contains all its points," a poet named Daneri is seeking to catalogue in verse the entire planet..."By 1941 he had dispatched some hectares of the state of Queensland, more than a millimeter of the course of the Ob, a gas-meter to the north of Veracruz..."

Queensland must have seemed remote and almost imaginary for Borges as the famous Porteño wrote this story in Spanish, in Buenos Aires, in the 1940s. Likewise the tyranny of distance makes Queensland a place far away from the day to day concerns of Europe, but Queenslandiana resides in collections all throughout the northern hemisphere.

To search through the cultural collections of Europe have a look on  http://www.europeana.eu/portal/ and type Queensland into the search box...you'll be amazed what you'll find.

Simon Farley

Heritage Collections

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