Book lists

Monday musings on Australian literature: The novel in Australia, 1927-style, Part 2

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Today’s Monday Musings is Part 2 of my two post series discussing Nettie Palmer‘s article, “The novel in Australia”, that was published in The Brisbane Courier, 15 October 1927.

As I did in last week’s post, I’ll use her headings to share her view on Australia’s great novels.

A novelist abroad

Here she discusses Australian writers who wrote their novels while living overseas, Australians being, as we know, good travellers. It’s no surprise that her choice of the best known novel written while its writer was abroad is Henry Handel Richardson’s* Maurice Guest (1909), which is a “brilliant story of music-student life in the Leipzig of the ‘nineties”. (This is another languisher on my TBR pile).

Palmer then tells us about Richardson’s Australian trilogy, The fortunes of Richard Mahoney, which she wrote mostly from her home in England though she “revisited Australia about 1912 to verify impressions”. Palmer’s article was written before the third book in the trilogy was published, but here she is on the first two:

The writer’s knowledge of the period – costumes, food, and customs – is immense but the “Fortunes” is never a mere costume novel: there is character all through. All Henry Handel Richardson’s novels, even those whose setting is wholly Australian, are better known in Europe than here, and are discussed at length in German and Scandinavian literary encyclopaedias and reviews. In America too, they have received deep attention. Victoria is fortunate to have found such a chronicler, more fortunate than it knows yet [my emphasis].

Cultural cringe, or because Richardson was based overseas? Whatever the reason, recognition of her work did increase through the century. The Australian Dictionary of Biography entry on Richardson, written in 1988, discusses her reputation briefly, and touches on the unevenness of her reputation – overseas and in Australia.

Contemporary novels

Palmer concludes her article by looking at contemporary (to the late 1920s, that is) novels, and names a few she deems significant.

Katharine Susannah Prichard

Prichard, 1927/8 (Courtesy: State Library of NSW, via Wikimedia Commons)

Katherine Susannah Prichard’s works, she says, “are the fruit of an intense devotion to her subject matter. Her gifts are mainly two: first, that of brilliant impressionism, then a rare power of writing group-scenes.” In Black Opal, for example, the opal miners are “standing about chaffing each other and discussing the universe, every man of them alive”. She says there are similarly vivid scenes of groups of timber-getters in Working Bullocks. “Such scenes”, she says, “are too difficult for most novelists, who shirk them: yet they enrich a book immensely and the reader feels that our everyday life is full of unsuspected charm”.

Palmer then writes something rather strange (to me anyhow). She comments that each of Prichard’s books is located in a different place – the tall-timbers of South-east Victoria (presumably The pioneers, which I’ve reviewed), the opal fields of Western New South Wales, and the saw-milling country in the south of Western Australia. She says:

(Reading over this list of regions I can only feel how wretchedly inconvenient our Australian names are: a mere mention of latitude and longitude! Are we too big to think about? It will take many years for many of our names to become easy and vivid.)

What does she mean? Those names are purely geographical descriptions. The pioneers is, yes, set in south-east Victoria but this region does have a name – Gippsland – which it has had since the nineteenth century. I don’t think I’m on Palmer’s wavelength here at all.

Anyhow she concludes this section with the statement that there’s “little space left for some recent Queensland books” (because, of course, The Brisbane Courier is a Queensland newspaper). She names Zora Cross, whose books “put on record the changing years of a South Queensland [ha!] district” and M. Forrest, whose novels “have that special quality which readers of her verse would expect – a power of painting in words the rich details of Queensland’s unexplored landscapes”.

Conclusion

As I read this article I pondered what criteria Palmer was using to define quality novels. Good characterisation, meaningful realism (if that makes sense), and a capturing of Australian identity seem to be what she was looking for. Fortunately, she has a go at answering this question herself in her last two paragraphs.

Firstly, she says that:

the most satisfactory definition of a good novel seems “the revelation of character through narrative,” but the character need not be only human. There is also the character of a country.

She then suggests that good novels break new ground, with the author “giving part of himself away, revealing his personal vision of ‘men, coming and going on the earth'”. On this point of innovation, she quotes Randolph Bedford, who appeared in Part 1 and who, she says, satirised the idea that “the average publisher loves words written to a formula, to please a reading public which dislikes anything new”. Bedford apparently said of this public:

It loves to read some old friend it recognises, so it can say, “How original it must be, because I know it so well”.

Oh dear. Have things changed do you think?

Palmer then presents her own definition of “a more genuine kind of originality” – and it’s to do with the difficulty of making “Australian life and character their theme”. She concludes:

Some day, when a novel about life in Indooroopilly seems as natural as one about Piccadilly, we shall thank those who turned the first sods so fruitfully.

So there it is really. The cultural cringe. This I think has changed.

* Wikipedia tells us she was Iris Murdoch’s second cousin twice removed. A remote relation, perhaps, but interesting nonetheless!

Monday musings on Australian literature: The novel in Australia, 1927-style, Part 1

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Nettie Palmer was one of Australia’s leading literary critics, not to mention essayist and poet, through the 1920s to 1940s. I have mentioned her several times in this blog, including in my post on Australia’s literary couples. She also mentored younger women writers such as Marjorie Barnard and Flora Eldershaw. However, what I want to discuss today – and next week – is the article she wrote in 1927, about “The novel in Australia”. It was published in The Brisbane Courier, 15 October 1927.

She starts by commenting that the number of “good novels written in Australia has been small”. There are reasons for this she says but discussing those is not her aim in this article. Rather, her plan is to reduce her list of “good” Australian novels to just the best. The result “is a nugget of surprisingly high quality”. And now my plan is to share with you those nuggets that she defined for her readers back in 1927. It makes for interesting and sometimes surprising reading. Here goes, using the headings she did.

Some early nuggets

She names two.

Thomas Alexander Browne (aka Rolf Boldrewood) (Public Domain from the National library of Australia, via Wikipedia)

Thomas Alexander Browne (aka Rolf Boldrewood), by Henry Walter Barnett (Public Domain from the NLA, via Wikipedia)

Henry Kingsley’s Geoffrey Hamlyn (1859), which is a book I have in my TBR and would love to find time to read. I’m not sure I had heard of it until a few years ago but it keeps popping up in unusual places which has piqued my interest. It has, Palmer says, without elaborating, “a very colonial outlook”.

Rolf Boldrewood’s Robbery under arms (1882), which I defy any self-respecting Australian to say they haven’t heard of (though I suspect many of us haven’t read it!). She does elaborate over one and a half paragraphs on this one! She writes that, despite its “truculent title”:

It is one of those rare books that can please on several different counts – as an adventure story, as a sketched historical background, and as a sons psychological novel.

I love that she praises it for its “fine and unexaggerated vernacular, without dropped aitches or other irritating apostrophes to spot its pages”. She sees it as a model for good novels in Australia.

Some successors

Palmer then says that it was a “long time before the simplicity and naturalness of that book was again reached”, but eventually some more nuggets appear.

Marcus Clarke’s For the term of his natural life (1870), but she does not elaborate.

Mrs Campbell Praed’s (or Rosa Praed as I know and have read her) “easy flowing books now almost forgotten” (1890s). Books being forgotten is, clearly, an age-old problem! Anyhow, she names one, which I haven’t read, Longleat of Koralbyn.Wikipedia tells us that it  was first published in 1881 under the exciting (my description!) title of Policy and passion! No wonder it was republished under a different title. I have read Praed’s rather raw The bonds of wedlock (1887). I laughed at Palmer’s comment that Praed’s books are set in Queensland but “the writer shirks the whole problem of making her Queensland live in the readers’ sight”. That could mean a number of things – but the important thing, I suppose, is that she likes Praed’s writing!

Then, though her subject is novels, she mentions short story writers, naming Louis Becke, Price Warung (whose stories I’ve reviewed), Henry Lawson and Albert Dorrington.

She concludes this section with the following:

For many years it has seemed that only short stories would ever be published again (and those only in fugitive form): any novels that appear have had every sort of circumstantial opposition to overcome.

Fugitive form? Does she mean in magazines (like The Bulletin, established in 1880) and newspapers rather than something more permanent like books? I suspect her comment about the difficulty of getting novels published is not totally incomprehensible to writers today?

Novels after 1900

Her choice of novels from the early twentieth century includes a couple of authors I don’t know. Regular readers here will recognise which ones they are by not having seen them mentioned here!

First up, of course, is Miles Franklin’s My brilliant career which she describes as a “bit of ironic auto-biography, set in an up-country township of the drearier sort”. Palmer, from the point of view of 1927, hopes that “some day she [Franklin] will be able to repeat her early success, looking through the opposite end of life’s telescope”. Franklin did achieve fictional success again, in the late 1930s, with All that swagger.

She then names Randolph Bedford’s – quick quiz question: have you heard him mentioned here? – two novels. True eyes and the whirlwind (1903) and The snare of strength (1905). (Don’t you love these titles?) Palmer describes the first as “a novel of the picaresque style, a useful type for expressing the nomadic youth spent by many Australians before they find their life’s work”. Interesting. I hadn’t quite realised just how far back the idea of Australians as travellers extends, but it reminded me that Patrick White spent time jackarooing in Australia, in the 1920s, and travelling overseas as he sought a place for himself in the world. Overall, she says, Bedford’s work “is never without a fine gusto”. Sounds worth checking out.

I’m pleased to see that she also includes in her list, Barbara Baynton and her novel The human toll (1907) which, she says “had a strong, if acrid life of its own … full of bush tragedy”. That’s our Baynton!

And finally, in this group, she names Louis Stone’s Jonah, “a Sydney story of young larrikins, done with sincerity”.

Palmer ends this section with a cry that is surely universal:

Out-of-print, out-of-print – that is what one has to lament about all these books! Many novels deserve to die in their year of birth, but what of those that have permanent quality? We can only beg for new editions.

I will conclude my discussion of her article in next week’s Monday Musings.

Monday musings on Australian literature: Indigenous writers recommend …

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Last week, to commemorate the beginning of NAIDOC Week, I devoted Monday Musings to Anita Heiss’s series of interviews with indigenous Australian writers, In conversation with BlackWords. I said then that this week’s post would also draw from the series – and so here it is.

I’m not 100% sure of Heiss’s process, but I think she sent the same set of questions to all writers, and they answered some or all of questions as they desired. I am focusing, in this post, on one of the questions. Seventeen of the twenty writers responded to it. The question is:

What book do you think every Australian should read?

Anita Heiss, Am I black enough for you?

Courtesy: Random House

The answers are fascinating. Most, as you would expect, recommend books that would help all Australians learn and understand more about indigenous culture and history, and the books they recommend are mostly by indigenous Australians. But, the interesting thing is that there’s a lot less duplication than I expected. I like this. It suggests the existence of an active indigenous literary culture. No simple, easily defined cannon here! It provides a great list for us all to go to – both now, and when we are planning for ANZLitLovers’ 2015 Indigenous Literature Week.

Anyhow, I thought, when I decided to do this post, that I could tally up the recommendations and list them in popularity order. But, given what I actually found, I have decided instead to simply list them in alphabetical order by author/editor, with the name of the recommender/s and comments where appropriate.

  • Berendt, Larissa: Home. Ellen van Neerven called this “A very important book.”
  • Carey, Peter*: True history of the Kelly Gang. Jared Thomas said it “alerted me to class struggle – the fact that it is not only Aboriginal people who have endured persecution in this country.”
  • Chi, Jimmy: Bran Nue Dae (script). Kim Scott.
  • Eckermann, Ali Cobby and Fogarty, Lionel (eds): Southerly, Vol 71, No. 2, 2011, “A Handful of Sand: Words to the Frontline”. Lorraine McGee-Sippel described this as “An invaluable resource of Australia’s First Nations writers … Across all genres, ages and life experiences”. She believes is should be “compulsory reading … in all high schools and universities”.
  • Eckermann, Ali Cobby: Ruby Moonlight. Bruce Pascoe.
  • Gammage, Bill*: The biggest estate on earth. Kim Scott simply said “an important book”.
  • Gilbert, Kevin: Because a white man’ll never do it. Kerry Reed-Gilbert, his daughter.
  • Green, Evan*: Adam’s empire. Sue McPherson described it as “a good Aussie story. It should be made into a film.”
  • Haebich, Anna*: For Their Own Good. Kim Scott said that it “focuses on south-west Western Australia, but the power relationship it articulates applies across the continent”.
  • Heiss, Anita: any book. Lionel Fogarty gave Heiss as an example in recommending “Indigenous-authored books such as those by Anita Heiss.
  • Heiss, Anita: Am I black enough for you? Jared Thomas, Bruce Pascoe (my review)
  • Heiss, Anita and Minter, Peter (eds): The Macquarie PEN Anthology of Aboriginal Literature. Kerry Reed-Gilbert.
  • Leane, Jeanine: Purple threads. Melissa Lucashenko (my review).
  • McMullen, Jeff*: any writing. Samuel Wagan Watson.
  • Maynard, John: Fight for liberty and freedom. Recommended by himself.
  • Munkara, Marie: Every secret thing. Bruce Pascoe (my review).
  • Papunya School with Nadia Wheatley and Ken Searle: The Papunya School Book of Country and History. Anita Heiss likes this because it is “accessible to all”.
  • Pascoe, Bruce: works by him. Recommended by himself.
  • Pascoe, Bruce: Earth. Melissa Lucashenko.
  • Pilger, John*: A secret country. Kate Howarth.
  • Reynolds, Henry*: any book. Kerry Reed-Gilbert argued that “it’s time for people to know the truth of this country”; Samuel Wagan Watson.
  • Reynolds, Henry*: Forgotten War. Lorraine McGee-Sippel said that it “addresses Australia’s selective amnesia in relation to the wars fought between Traditional Owners and the Invaders. Where are our memorials?”
  • Reynolds, Henry*: This whispering in our hearts. Jackie Huggins.
  • Scott, Kim: Benang: From the heart. Bruce Pascoe.
  • Scott, Kim: That deadman dance. Kerry Reed-Gilbert; Bruce Pascoe (my review).
  • Scott, Kim: True country. Melissa Lucashenko.
  • Thiele, Colin*: Labourers in the vineyard. Bruce Pascoe.
  • Weller, Archie: stories by him. Bruce Pascoe.
  • Willmot, Eric: Pemulwuy: The rainbow warrior. Dub Leffler.
  • Wright, Alexis: Carpentaria. Bruce Pascoe (my review).
  • Wright, Judith*: stories and poems by her. Bruce Pascoe.
Kim Scott also recommended that people read an anthology of writing from the region in which they live, such as Those Who Remain Will Always Remember: an Anthology of Aboriginal Writing, edited by Rosemary van den Berg, Anne Brewster and Angeline O’Neill.

Tegan Chillcott and Samuel Wagan Watson were a little wary of being prescriptive. Chillcott said, simply, ““whatever book seems most interesting to them”.  Watson, though was a little more explanatory. He said:

Every Australian?’ Hmmm … It’s hard to say, and I know mature Australians who have admitted to having never finished reading a book because literature bores them. I can’t answer that question? I’ve never watched a cricket match in my 41 years either … So I must seem weird to people who don’t pick up a book. If I was on a ‘soapbox’, I’d say any writing by Uncle Henry Reynolds or Uncle Jeff McMullen.

But some people can be turned off literature – altogether – by books that are too confronting. And that’s the delicate balance that needs to be dealt by a writer when you’re thinking about audiences. I do believe some writers have no idea that they are either not engaging with an audience or they don’t care? As a writer, on the journey of composing your work or novel or music, you need to consider your audience at every turning point. If you don’t think about the needs of your reader, you are simply writing in a very tight vacuum.

Another respondent who didn’t seem keen to name specific titles or authors was Samantha Faulkner.

Papunya School Book

(Courtesy: Allen & Unwin)

I’d like to conclude with her lovely, generous statement. She wrote:

Any book by an Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander writer. Reading a book by a First Nations Australian writer will identify similarities that connect us, and bring us together, rather than divide us. After all, we live on this beautiful country together.

* Non-indigenous author

Monday musings on Australian literature: Reading Matters’ ANZLitMonth

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ReadingMattersANZLitLogoThis is the third year that expat journalist Kim has hosted an Australian Literature month on her blog Reading Matters – except that this year, for the first time, she has included New Zealand literature in her scope. As she writes in her introductory post, her aim is to celebrate and “raise awareness of the amazing range of literature produced by these two countries, much of which never gets publicised beyond their shores”. 

Over the month, which is nearly over, she has reviewed several books from the antipodes, highlighted some current award winners and interesting shortlists, used Australian bloggers for her Triple Choice Tuesdays, and published some specific suggested readings posts (including two guest posts). 

With Kim’s permission, I’m providing links to the suggested readings posts in today’s Monday Musings. As a reader of my blog, you’ve already shown an interest in Aussie literature, and so it’s likely the most of you will probably have heard of many of the books listed in these posts, but you never know …

Kim’s Triple Choice Tuesdays are always worth checking out. In them she asks her chosen blogger to name three books: a favourite, one that changed his/her world, and one that deserves wider recognition. The Aussie bloggers featured (so far) this month are:

  • Kirsten Krauth, author of just_a_girl (my review)
  • Book to the Future (Michelle McLaren), whose plan is to read (and review) a book from every year of the 20th century in chronological order
  • Alan Carter, crime novelist who was born in England but emigrated to Australia in 1991

These links provide just a sample of what has been happening over at Reading Matters this month. To see more, check out this link to all posts for the month …

Thanks Kim for hosting another month promoting our literature – and for the opportunity to write a guest post. I look forward to next year’s event!

Monday musings on Australian literature: Here come the men!

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Women really have dominated the literary awards season in Australia over the last two years. In 2012, the majority of the awards were won by Anna Funder with All that I am and Gillian Mears with Foal’s bread. Last year it was mostly Michelle de Kretser with Questions of travel and Carrie Tiffany with Mateship with birds. ML Stedman also won an award with her The light between oceans. As well as all this, last year we had, for the first time ever, an all female shortlist for the Miles Franklin Award! Where, you may have been wondering, were the men?

Well, in their writing rooms it seems, beavering away, because by late last year their books started appearing in droves … and nice to see it is. I love reading fiction by women, but I also love reading fiction by men. Let’s face it, I love reading good fiction! Anyhow, I, and others like The Australian’s literary editor Stephen Romei, expect some strong showings by our male writers in this year’s award lists. Books like:

  • Richard Flanagan’s The narrow road to the deep north
  • Tom Keneally’s Shame and captives
  • Roger McDonald’s The following
  • Alex Miller’s Coal Creek
  • Christos Tsiolkas’ Barracuda
  • Tim Winton’s Eyrie

Stephen Romei predicts that Winton and Flanagan will battle it out, though says there are other strong contenders from a bumper year for Australian fiction. I will be reading Tsiolkas and Winton with my reading group over the next few months, and received Flanagan for Christmas. I am greatly looking forward to getting my teeth into these writers, each of whom I’ve reviewed before on this blog, and each of whom I respect and enjoy.

None of these, though, are debut authors. Every one has won and/or been shortlisted for the Miles Franklin at least once, and most, more than once. Of course it takes a little time for a debut to make it into public consciousness. However, you may remember that last year’s Miles Franklin Award shortlist of five titles contained three – yes, three – debut novels (Floundering, by Romy Ash, The Beloved by Annah Faulkner, The Mountain by Drusilla Modjeska). That was healthy, and augurs well for the future, but I wonder if we’ll see any debut novels by male authors in the shortlists this year? While I don’t report regularly on awards, I’ll certainly be keeping an eye out for new authors appearing on the scene – or, indeed, for more established authors making their debut on the award lists.

Meanwhile, of course, I’ll continue to read Aussie women for the Australian Women Writers’ Challenge, including Hannah Kent’s debut novel Burial rites which could very well give the men a run for their money this year if the buzz surrounding this book is right.

2014 looks to be another exciting year for Australian fiction. How do you – Aussies and otherwise – see your reading shaping up for the year?

Monday musings on Australian literature: Coming up in 2013

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In a first for Whispering Gums, I have decided to post about coming attractions. It seemed an appropriate first Monday Musings for the year. But, how to do it? As I can’t possibly list them all, I’m going to make a selection and group them in sets that make sense to me. So here, as you’ve heard me say before, goes. Remember, this is just a selection reflecting the sorts of books I’d like to read. Whether or not I actually manage to read them all is another thing entirely.

John Maxwell Coetzee

Coetzee, 2006 (Courtesy: Mariusz Kubik, via Wikipedia)

Fiction from authors I’ve read before

  • J.M. Coetzee, The childhood of Jesus (March 2013 from Text Publishing): It’s been over 5 years since Coetzee’s last piece of fiction, Diary of a bad year (my review). I look forward to seeing whether Coetzee plays further with the novelistic form, as he has in recent outings, in this new offering.
  • Richard Flanagan, The narrow road to the deep north (August 2013 from Random House): Similarly it’s been over 4 years since Flanagan’s Wanting (which I read before starting this blog). This new novel, I gather, moves from Australia where his previous novels have been set to the Burma-Siam death camps.
  • Andrea Goldsmith, The memory trap (May 2013 from Fourth Estate): Goldsmith’s last novel Reunion (my review) was not my favourite Goldsmith, but she’s well worth watching.
  • Joan London (November 2013 from Random House): I don’t know the title of London’s next book, but I can’t wait to see it, as her Gilgamesh (which I virtually gifted to Stu) is one of my favourite Australian novels. My review of her most recent novel, The good parents (2008), was one of my first reviews on this blog.
  • Alexis Wright, The swan book (August 2013 from Giramondo): It’s been nearly 7 years since Indigenous author Wright’s last novel, Carpentaria (my review). It won the Miles Franklin award in 2007 so a new one from her is long-awaited.

Fiction from authors I’ve been meaning to read

  • Georgia Blain, The secret lives of men (April 2013 from Scribe): A collection of short stories and you know how I like short stories.
  • Fiona Capp, Gotland (July 2013 from Fourth Estate): Apparently about a reluctant Prime Minister’s wife, but this article written by Capp in 2009 might throw some light on the title.
  • Steven Carroll, A world of other people (May 2013 Fourth Estate): A Miles Franklin Award winning author I haven’t read. Boo me!
  • Robert Gott, The holiday murders (February 2013 from Scribe): OK, I’m lying with this one. Gott is not an author I’ve been meaning to read. In fact, I’d never heard of him. He has written children’s books, crime (not my genre), and a newspaper cartoon. Why then you are probably asking am I including him? Well, he, like PL Travers of Mary Poppins fame, was born in the same not-well-known town that I was, Maryborough in Queensland. And that’s good enough in my mind to give him a nod!
  • Chris Womersley, Cairo (September 2013 from Scribe): I’m still hoping to find time to read Womersley’s second and well-reviewed novel, Bereft, but if I don’t, this might well be my introduction to him.

Debut fiction

  • Balli Kaur Jaswal, Inheritance (February 2013 from Sleepers)
  • Lesley Jørgensen, Cat & fiddle (February 2013 from Scribe)
  • Maurilia Meehan, Madame Bovary’s haberdashery (April 2013 from Transit Lounge): Described as quirky crime novel, so I might just be interested.

Non-fiction

  • Anna Goldsworthy, Quarterly Essay (June 2013 from Black Inc): I’ve reviewed a couple of Quarterly Essays (by Krien and Flannery) and am interested in this one which will apparently be on misogyny/feminism in Australian politics.
  • Anna Krien, Night games (May 2013 from Back Inc): I’ve reviewed Krien’s Into the woods about forestry in Tasmania (my review) and her Quarterly Essay (see above). I enjoy her style and perspective. This book is apparently about the rape trial of a footballer.
  • John Safran, Murder in Mississippi (July 2013 from Penguin): This intrigues me – an Australian writing about the murder of a white supremacist in the American south – but then Safran has made somewhat of a career of investigating religion and related issues around the world.
  • Helen Trinca, Madeleine (April 2013 from Text): I’ve reviewed one of Madeleine St John’s novels, The women in black (my review), and know a little of her life. She was apparently the first Australian women to be shortlisted for the Booker Prize. She’s also a peer of Australian expat intellectuals, Germaine Greer, Robert Hughes, Clive James and filmmaker Bruce Beresford who, many years ago, optioned The women in black for film. I’d love to read this biography.

For more information about these or other books coming out in 2013, you might like to check the publishers’ websites:

Highlights of 2012: Notable reads for 2012

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To complete my 2012 round-up triumvirate, which started with my blogging highlights and was followed by my Australian Women Writers challenge wrap-up, this post documents my notable reads of the year. If you are sick of me and my round-ups, I won’t be offended if you click away now!

Like last year, I’m not doing a top 10, because I find defining “top” reads such a movable feast. I would really like to list almost everything I read! So, again, I’m listing my notable reads under categories to give a flavour of this year’s reading life. Last year’s categories were based on review clichés and jargon, but this year I’m going to just make up my own, as whim takes me. Here goes, in no particular order:

Most disappointing read: PD James’ Death comes to Pemberley. It’s not that it was a bad book, exactly, but I’m not much of a crime reader and I don’t tend to read Jane Austen sequels/spin-offs, and I just felt this didn’t cut it, mainly because Elizabeth and Darcy didn’t ring true. They were flat, there was no chemistry. Without that, it was lost.

Most surprising read: Fergus Hume’s The mystery of a hansom cab. What did I say about not reading crime? Well, that’s partly why this was my most surprising read, because it is a late nineteenth century Australian crime novel and I loved it. It provided such a great social history of Melbourne of the period – and was a rollicking good read as well. Quite coincidentally a new telemovie adaptation was broadcast late in the year, and I enjoyed that too.

Francesa Rendle-Short book cover Bite your tongue

Bite your tongue Bookcover (Courtesy: Spinifex Press)

Bravest book: Francesca Rendle-Short’s Bite your tongue. I loved the creative way Rendle-Short went about telling her uncomfortable story via a fictional-memoir. This book is an example of what Rebecca Giggs meant when she talked about writers finding new modes of authority by which they can describe (and we can find valid) how the world “actually” is.

Most inspiring book: Izzeldin Abuelaish’s I shall not hate. What can I say? Abuelaish’s ability to rise above a pain that no parent should face, the death of his daughters in a targeted terrorist attack, and continue to argue for peace and reconciliation between Palestinians and Israelis should be a lesson to us all. I have never liked the idea of revenge, but also have never had my philosophy seriously tested. He has and shows that it is possible to see things a different way.

Favourite e-Book: Willa Cather’s My Antonia. I didn’t read many e-Books this year, but this e-notated version of an American classic was special. While I had some reservations about a couple of the features, overall the e-notation enhanced my reading and, anyhow, it’s a great novel. A re-read for me, and I’d read it again (if I had the time!)

Book scoring most “hits”: Julian Barnes’ The sense of an ending. This popularity was quite a surprise. I was fairly late – given its 2011 Man Booker Prize win – to read and review it, and yet my post seems to score high in Google searches. Why, I have no idea, but there you go! I’m happy to list it in my “notable reads” because, besides its being popular with the search engines, I liked it.

Favourite classic: Elizabeth Harrower’s The watch tower. I read a few “classics” this year – novels and short stories – and enjoyed them all. There’s something about reading good writers from the past – for learning about the world they were writing in, and for providing a different perspective on our own world (if that makes sense). Harrower’s novel is so of its time and place and yet is absolutely universal in its study of power and control in intimate relationships.

Favourite translated novel: Yan Lianke’s Dream of Ding Village. This was one of the books I read for the Shadow Man Asian prize earlier in the year. I also liked the winning book Kyung-Sook Shin’s Please look after mother and several others but, as time has gone on, it’s Ding Village that most often comes back to me. A great study of power and greed, with personal and political implications.

Favourite recent Australian book: Gillian Mears’ Foals’ bread. What can I say? This is one of those books that hits you in the guts. It’s about character, passion (of all sorts), and the ambiguities in human relationships – and Mears nails it.

Favourite short story: Paddy O’Reilly’s “The salesman”. This was very hard, so much so that I nearly decided not to create a category for it. I read several great short stories in 2012 but I had not read O’Reilly before and I was impressed by her control of the form. It’s a powerful story about deprivation, racism and the violence that lies just, only just, below the surface. It’s both subtle and unsubtle at the same time.

That’s 10. I could go on with more categories but I won’t bore you any further. Before I go, though, I’ll just, because I can, give a special mention to those writers who are published by the little presses and who deserve wider notice: Nigel Featherstone (Blemish Books), Catherine McNamara (Indigo Dreams) who has a collection of literary short stories coming out in 2013 to follow her 2012 commercial novel, and Michael Sala (Affirm Press).

My most unforgettable books, to date!

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I was going to title this post “Life-changing reads” but decided that that wasn’t quite right. I’m not sure that any book has quite changed my life though many have opened my eyes to other ways of seeing and being in the world.

May marked my third year of blogging and I started this post then, thinking to mark the moment by reflecting on the books that have most impacted me (in some way or another). Somehow life got in the way, and I am only getting back to it now. I think it’s still worth doing – for my benefit, if not for anyone else’s. It’s going to be hard to keep my list short – as you litbloggers and litblog readers will surely understand. So here goes, in alphabetical order by author – it’s hard enough limiting the number (to a self-imposed arbitrary number of ten) without ranking them too!

Margaret Atwood‘s The handmaid’s tale: Such an astonishing evocation of what might happen should extremist fundamentalist views be taken to their, hmm, logical conclusion. The book functions as both a wake-up call – we can never rest on our laurels while injustice and inequality remain in our world – and a great read.

Jane Austen‘s Pride and prejudice: A great read on multiple levels that introduced me to Austen. I love all Austen’s novels and really can’t pick a favourite, but this is the one that started it all. I can read (and have read) her books multiple times – and every time I find something new. Can’t ask more than that from a writer I reckon.

Albert Camus‘ The plague: Oh, this one fed my youthful idealism, except I don’t think I’ve ever grown out of the belief that Camus’ Rieux is right when he says “that there are more things to admire in men than to despise”. I have read this three times, and will read it again. (My review)

Gabriel Garcia Marquez‘s Chronicle of a death foretold: It’s all about the tone. I love the way this story is told. I’ve read and enjoyed other books by Garcia Marquez but this is the one that stays in my brain.

Kazuo Ishiguro‘s The remains of the day: This one’s all about the tone too – and the unreliable narrator. There’s a wry humour to the butler’s narrow-minded focus on things that don’t matter while being completely oblivious to the things that do.  I have gone on to read all (but one, so far) of Ishiguro’s oeuvre.

Elizabeth Jolley‘s The newspaper of Claremont Street: I loved the black humour here. It reminded me of a (very) modern Jane Austen. I’m sure Austen would have loved Jolley. After all, I love them both.

Rohinton Mistry‘s A fine balance: This book showed me how a grim book can still offer hope (though not all readers agree with me). What else can I say? If you haven’t read it, I say do!

Toni Morrison‘s Beloved: This post was inspired by the “Getting started with Toni Morrison” post at Book Riot. It’s impossible to forget Sethe and the decision she makes.

Junichiro Tanizaki‘s The Makioka sisters: I didn’t know much about Japan when I read this in the early 1990s, but what I knew was that it was a pretty homogenous society. And, it is, but The Makioka sisters showed me a more diverse society than I had imagined. This is not the main subject of the book, but it was eye-opening for me. I also enjoyed it as a thoughtful analysis of Japan on the cusp of change from a traditional to a modern society , particularly in relation to the lives of women. Oh, and it is an engrossing story.

Patrick White‘s Voss: What can I say? Voss introduced me to Patrick White. It spoke to my teenage sense of the romance of grand ideas and of doomed love in language that was intense but accessible. I went on to read more Patrick White – and am still reading him. I’ve some still to read, and some I’ve read more than once. Such is the life of a reader…

Three of these books – Pride and prejudice, The plague and Voss – I read in my teens. I shall be forever grateful to them for the introduction they provided to the world of literature and what it can mean to one’s life.

I’d love to hear about the books that resonate most with you. (And I’m sure that, for some of your choices at least, I’ll say, “Oh yes, that too!”)

Monday musings on Australian literature: The Australian Novel, 1945 style

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Joseph Furphy (Tom Collins)

Joseph Furphy (Presumed Public Domain, from the State Library of New South Wales, via Wikipedia)

Every now and then I like to delve into the newspapers digitised by the National Library of Australia and made available via its website. Last week, I was pottering around researching another topic for Monday Musings (for which you’ll now have to wait) when I came across an article written in 1945 about a series of books,”arranged” by Colin Roderick, being published about Australian prose. The series aimed “at introducing to students the work of Australian writers of prose fiction” but another article suggested that it would be of value to adult readers interested in the subject.

The first volume is titled The Australian novel and was published in 1945. It’s an anthology containing précis and excerpts from the selected works, and some critical analysis, and has a foreword by Miles Franklin. She wrote that:

People settling in new lands need novels and dramas closely concerned with their own time, place and community to support and lighten the great classics and world masterpieces in literature. Certain stories relate us to our own soil, and when such works find universal acceptance, they still retain greater significance for the people of their origin than for other readers by imparting a comforting glow which springs from the intimacy of home … writings, redolent of our own land and our life in it, thus fulfilled one of the functions of imaginative literature by heightening and illuminating everyday life in familiar surroundings.

I love her description of “writings redolent of our own land and our life in it” and their importance to “illuminating everyday life”.

The 19 (strange number, eh?) works were presented in order of their age:

It’s an intriguing list for me. Some of these works and authors I’ve read, and some have been on my list to read for a long time. But there are some here that I have never heard of – such as Brian Penton and Leonard Mann. It makes me wonder which writers from our last half century or so will be no longer well-known in 60 or 70 years. Longevity in the arts is such a fickle thing really, isn’t it?

Next week, I’ll write on the second volume in which Roderick presented 20 significant novelists.

Raising my consciousness: Thoughts of a reader on International Women’s Day

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Australian Women Writers Challenge 2012 Badge

Australian Women Writers Challenge (Design: Book’dout – Shelleyrae)

I am not, and never have been, scared to use the “F” word – that is, I call myself a Feminist. My philosophy is a simple one: women are not the SAME as men, but women deserve EQUAL rights and respect as men. This is not to say that the interpretation and application of this philosophy is simple but it is to say that all our thinking on how we live, how we (as humans) should be treated and how we should treat others needs to start from this fundamental principle.

Books and reading have of course fed my thinking on this issue … and so today I’m listing a few books that have meant something to me. They are not, all anyhow, the usual suspects, but they are books that have remained in my consciousness years after I read them.

Germaine Greer‘s The female eunuch (1970)

I read this a year or so after it was published. It provided an underpinning to my thoughts from that point on. Greer’s analysis of how women are objectified fundamentally changed how I viewed myself and it informed how I have dressed and presented myself ever since. She politicised my decisionmaking and gave me permission to not spend time and money (that I could better spend elsewhere) on unnecessary grooming and uncomfortable, or demeaning, clothing. She said much more besides about women’s self-actualisation but it all stemmed for me from this basic premise …

Margaret Atwood‘s The handmaid’s tale (1985)*

Most of the books I’m going to list here are non-fiction but we litbloggers know the value of fiction in presenting and analysing human thought and behaviour, in showing us how we are and/or how we could be. Atwood’s The handmaid’s tale depicts with horrific clarity how we could be. It’s a dystopian novel, a cautionary tale; it describes with horrendous, gob-smacking clarity what could happen if we don’t remain vigilant about women’s right to equality. If you haven’t read it and you wonder whether Feminism’s for you, read this book before you make up your mind!

Diane Bell‘s Generations: Grandmothers, mothers and daughters (1987)

I recently read an article written in 1905 about Jane Austen, in which the author, William James Dawson, wrote:

It is often deplored that professional historians, who are capable enough of describing the pageantries of a court, the contests of politicans, the sumptuous lives of the rich, or even the miserable conditions of life among the disinherited and the criminal, appear incapable of producing any accurate picture of the average kind of life lived by those distinguished by neither great  wealth nor great poverty …

Lives, for example, lived by women. Dawson goes on to say that Jane Austen provides “a picture of England itself”. I love his recognition that fiction can provide us with social history … even though the rest of my list is non-fiction.

Anthropologist Diane Bell describes objects in women’s lives and how women pass them down from generation to generation. If I tell you that one of the chapters is titled “Darryl got the farm and mum got the pearls” you’ll get the picture. The book draws from interviews she conducted with several families of women. The women talk about pianos, sewing machines, textile crafts, jewellery, china, books, and so on, describing not only how they are passed down through the female line but also the memories these objects invoke – and what they tell us about women’s lives then and now. It’s a beautiful book, that I’d love to quote from if I had the time. I read it when it came out, and I think of it often.

Katie Holmes’ Spaces in her day: Australian women’s diaries, 1920s-1930s (1995)

Holmes is an historian and this book, like Bell’s, provides an insight into women’s lives – but through their diaries rather than through interviews. The book, also like Bell’s, is organised thematically but instead of by type of object hers is by women’s roles and life stages. The descriptions of women’s work (in the days before labour saving devices) are exhausting!

Start work 8 o’clock finish 11pm, feel awfully fed up, this life is much worse than the farm was even if I didnt have any clothes, here I do not have time to wear them, so it is worse, dont know what to do about it, but I am fed up. (Mabel Lincoln, 21 January 1930)

She also describes the way women were expected to give up their dreams to help others – to take over a family when a sister dies or becomes sick, for example. Unmarried women, in particular, were only “allowed” a life of their own for as long as someone else in the family didn’t need them. Another book I haven’t easily forgotten.

Helen Garner‘s The first stone (1995)

This is, probably, a strange book for me to include, mainly because Garner made me so MAD. Garner is a feminist but her response to the incident at Ormond College did not sit well with many feminists, me included. As I recollect, the incident involved the master of the College, the man in power that is, making untoward (read, unwanted) sexual advances to two students at a College party. When the students complained to the College hierarchy, they did nothing, so the two young women went to the police. Garner argued they should not have done that, that they should have simply, literally or metaphorically, “slapped” the man and got on with their lives, leaving him and his reputation secure. She felt their reaction was not mature and was taking the issue of harassment to unnecessary levels. But, for me, there were two significant issues that made me disagree vehemently with Garner. Firstly, the young women tried to complain within the College system and got nowhere. Had the College taken their complaint seriously, the situation could very well have been handled quietly and with a rationality that could have worked for all parties. But, the College didn’t. And secondly, this was a situation of power. It’s (depending on the situation) one thing to receive an unwanted advance at a party from a peer. Garner’s suggested response could very well be the appropriate one BUT, and I think it’s a big BUT, it’s quite another thing to receive such an advance from someone with real power over you. I’ve listed this book, though, because Garner is a great writer and so very honest about her views and feelings. We need more honesty like this, and more willingness to confront the issues and tease them out … and that, of course, is the other reason I’ve listed it. It got some issues teased out, albeit, for some, in an emotionally charged and hurtful way.

… and that, as they say, is that. I’d love to know what books have contributed to your thinking on women’s rights (or, indeed, on any issue of importance to you).

* Most of the books I’ve listed here are Australian but, given the topic is International Women’s Day and given the significance (to me) of Atwood, I had to include her here.