Identity
The search for identity and analysis of the many means at the disposal of modern Australian society to obstruct that quest lies at the heart of much of Dawe’s poetry. In “Americanised” the obstacle to identity is the persistent encroachment of American consumer products into the lives of Australians. In fact, this poem suggest two separate but intertwined hindrances to attaining identity: the undo intrusion of American culture into Australia and the effects of consumer culture that confuses the meaning of identity, removing it from the sphere of who one is and situating it in the concept of what one owns. Less concerned with the external influence of America upon Australian identity is the analysis societal conformity running throughout “Enter Without So Much as Knocking.” Using the life passage of a single boy as a metaphor for everyone, the poem presents a stark view of the extent to which capitalism becomes a far more sinister influence upon one’s life than a mere economic system.
Dehumanization
Part and parcel with the search for identity and the negative impact that consumer culture has upon that search is the dehumanizing element that seeks to turn the individual into a faceless cog in the machinery. For Dawe, however, it is consumerism and capitalism that are mere cogs. Throughout his verse, the dehumanizing element at play in modern society ranges from government and business bureaucracy to the mediated messages encouraging conformity targeting people through television, radio and film and even the authoritarian role played by something as seemingly benign as traffic lights and signs. The urban landscape becomes a jungle in which the individual is seen as prey to be feasted upon by the collective. In “For the Duration” and “Weapons Training” the metaphorical attempt to escape being deprived of one’s innate humanity is made concrete in the setting of a military milieu in which a soldier or prisoner retaining a grip upon their humanity is too dangerous to allow.
Celebration of the Working Class
The heroes of a Dawe poem are the simple, hard-working members of society who maybe love Australian rules football a little too zealously, who daily pitch battle against the machine that wants to strip them of their dignity and turn them into commodities and who bears all the physical scars of living far away from the beautiful life. These heroes are beer drinkers and sports fans for the most part, but they range from the aptly title the Lincoln of the Market vendors “Big Jim” to all the many unnamed folks tending to their vegetable garden to whom Dawe has created the taxonomic classification of subspecies known as “Homo Suburbiensis.” This breed represents a special kind of hero who seeks to find solace and peace and meaning in life away from the dehumanizing effects surrounding them by retreating to the small suburban gardens they tend in the yard. The garden becomes a metaphor for that larger world beyond understanding outside its boundaries; a world which in which sense can be made and significance can be re-established.
