In manorial houses bookends were impressive in their own right, ready to bear the weight of expectation that was placed on their lords. The carvings, the shields and the embossing matched the conviction, embodied in the texts and documents housed between them, that this was no ordinary house, the history held between the bookends no ordinary history.
Modern Australian history is bookended by the arrival of white settlers in which Indigenous Australians were expelled to the margins, and by the arrival of people seeking protection who were themselves expelled to the margins on Manus Island and Nauru.
Between these bookends lie the events, the people, the relationships, the enterprises and the experiences that compose the story of Australia. They include acts of courage and cowardice, wisdom and stupidity, selfishness and generosity, nobility and barbarism. There are incidents that evoke shame and others that arouse pride.
There is a history of sin and a history of grace, and both intermingle in the story of what has mattered to Australians over more than two centuries.
The bookends themselves, though, are a bit shonky: four-by-two off-cuts nailed together. Not ideal for supporting proudly the heft of the history that lies between them. They are flawed pillars that question the order and the seriousness of the history they hold together. They need fixing.
The arrival of the first fleet was a masterly feat of organisation and initiative, followed by all the hardships, hard work and muddle involved in building and sustaining a colony. But its foundations were the dispossession of the original inhabitants and the disruption of their lives and cultures.
The inevitable conflict of interest between the Indigenous original inhabitants and the newcomers was seasoned by great acts of generosity on both sides, but was resolved in favour of the colonisers' interests. Violent resistance was crushed with overwhelming force and virtual impunity.
Eventually Indigenous Australians won some protection at the cost of free movement on their ancestral lands and vulnerability to catastrophic policies based on racial ideology. The disproportionate number of incarcerated Indigenous Australians is an emblem of this history. This bookend is made of wormwood.
"These two bookends need fixing because both involve a policy designed to advantage one group by treating another group brutally. This has corrupted Australian society and has had fatal consequences."
We Australians are still coming to terms with the consequences of invasion, settlement and exclusion of Indigenous Australians. Among the descendants of the later arrivals is