An effort to reposition Australian literature within world literary paradigms has been ongoing for almost twenty years. The essay argues that in the contemporary moment, however, what is required is a greater focus on ‘deep time’, longer histories and pre-settlement cultures, as well as a re-reading of the imperial archive more actively against itself, re-animating and respecting Indigenous voices speaking both on country and in sovereignty. A critical politics of comparison needs not just more informed attention to comparable Anglophone settler literatures, but also to contexts where obvious differences can hide telling connections. Trans- indigenous vectors are revealing, moving outside the determining boundaries of imperial cartography. Tracking Australian literature’s reception further, beyond the Anglophone world, can allow alternative canons to move into view, through which much of the dominant national narrative is refracted and reformed in often unexpected ways.