Archie Weller did not take a traditional route to the top of the literary tree in his native Australia, although since modern Australia is a country that was created to house criminals transported from Britain, it is actually quite fitting. After his release from Broome Jail, Weller had an enormous chip on his shoulder because he was incarcerated for a crime that he still maintained he did not commit. Within six weeks of his release, he had penned his first novel, The Day of the Dog, which catapulted onto the world stage and won him a Western Australia Premier Book Award for Prose Fiction.
One of the most oft-seen themes of Weller's writing is cultural identity, chiefly, the Aboriginal identity in Australia. The title story of this collection of stories and novellas takes place in the 1980s and follows the Aboriginal protagonist as he succeeds beyond his wildest expectations at university. He is a natural athlete, gifted student and prolific artist, but his success has come at a price; he has chosen to turn his back on his family; the story deals with his nostalgic return to his roots at the age of twenty one. Other themes of the stories are bullying and acceptance.
Weller's second novel, Land of the Golden Clouds, references the indigenous culture in its title, this being the Aboriginal term for their homeland. This is similar to the Maori depiction of neighboring New Zealand as the land of the long white cloud.
In 2000, Weller penned the screenplay for the movie Confessions of a Head-Hunter, for which he was awarded the Film Critics Circle of Australia Award for Best Short Film.
