Just as it does today, crime permeated popular culture throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Australian audiences eagerly consumed stories about criminality presented in fiction, film, music and the writings of those with some personal experience of crime or the criminal justice system.
These works have played a role in shaping public attitudes towards crime, and societal conceptions of who criminals are. In order to convey a sense of the types of perspectives on crime that permeated Australian culture, and how these representations changed over time, the pages below present timelines about significant works produced across different genres.