Part 1 | Part 2Australian settlers found themselves confronted by a ‘death-like silence’ which refused to yield to their colonial ambitions. The land was too dry. In his lecture for Sydney Ideas, historian (and broadcaster) Michael Cathcart argues that this experience of silence produced a melancholy brand of Australian nationalism which made heroes of dead explorers. At the heart of this lecture lies this single proposition: we do not know ourselves or the land in which we live until we understand its water. Ultimately, it is water which will determine the future of Australia. Sydney Ideas, University of Sydney, August 2009 Less