This new study offers a timely and compelling account of why past generations of Australians have seen the north of the country as an empty land, and how those perceptions of Australia’s tropical regions impact current policy and shape the self-image of the nation. It considers the origins of these concerns - from fears of invasion and moral qualms about leaving resources lying idle, from apprehensions about white nationhood coming under international censure and misgivings about the natural attributes of the north - and elucidates Australians’ changing appreciations of the natural environments of the north, their shifting attitudes toward race and their unsettled conceptions of Asia.