Charles Mountford (1890–1976)

I wanted a collection of Dreamtime myths from the moment I arrived in Australia, but it took me almost 10 years to find it and when I did, it was from a Canadian bookseller.

I picked it up today and read it all in about 90 minutes. The introduction, written in the mid-60's, tries to be respectful, and succeeds for the most part, but the style was at times hard to swallow: it sounded like one of those wildlife tv shows from the 70's.

The stories themselves, and the paintings that pair with show more them, are mostly well told, though I noticed areas of geography are referred to by their colonial names. The art is wonderful, sometimes haunting and sometimes disturbing, but always beautifully executed. show less

This series by Mountford and Roberts are beautifully illustrated with gorgeous haunting paintings. I have the original editions and the Dreamtime stories come from all over Australia.

The subtitle of the book is "Australian Aboriginal Myths in Paintings by Ainslie Roberts". The author, Charles Mountford, is an ethnologist who enlisted the help of artist Ainslie Roberts to illustrate the traditional stories of the native people of Australia. How close the author's interpretations are to the true meanings of the aborigines, i cannot say, but it is good that someone has taken the time to record this unique culture in a way that a non-aborigine can experience it.

The First Sunrise is a companion volume to The Dreamtime and The Dawn of Time, two books which have been one of the greatest publishing successes of recent years. The concept of those two books - and of The First Sunrise - was developed through an association between the famous ethnologist Charles Mountford and the artist Ainslie Roberts. Both men have an intimate knowledge of the Australian outback. Mr Roberts has made extensive painting tours through remote regions, and Mr. Mountford spent show more many years on research into the lives of the Aboriginal peoples. During that time, he collected many of the myths with which the Aborigines explain the creation of the world and all that lives and lies therein. This book contains a further thirty-two new paintings by Ainslie Roberts based on Aboriginal mythology. Charles Mountford has once more written an introduction and his interpretation of the myths. Source: Publisher for 2022 ETT Imprint edition show less