I've been meaning to read more Australian literature for a while now, but my focus on fiction in translation has got in the way of that a little. Actually, that's a slight understatement - in the first eight months of the year, I didn't manage to review a single Australian book...
However, with a trip to the Melbourne Writers Festival on the agenda, it was time to crack open one of the many books languishing on my shelves. Gerald Murnane is a writer I've been wanting to try for some time, and (as I mentioned in my festival review) he's certainly an entertaining speaker. Let's see what I think about his writing ;)
*****
The Plains, one of the first titles in the Text Classics series, is a short novel written back in 1982. It follows a man who ventures into inland Australia to explore 'the plains', an undefined area away from the noise of the east-coast cities. His reason for visiting the interior is to work on a film, a piece which will capture the splendour of the wide-open expanses, and after a short period of adjustment, he meets a group of local landowners, whose patronage is vital if he is to be able to work on his project.
Things are very different on the plains, though, and time passes differently to how it moves in 'Outer Australia'. As the days pass, we suspect that there is very little chance of the film ever being finished, the man's lengthy stay reaching epic proportions. Still, the longer he works on his project, the more he realises that the plains are worth studying - even if he'll never be able to understand them completely.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is pretty much the whole plot of The Plains - if you're the kind of reader who likes things to, you know, happen in a novel, then I'd advise you to cut your losses here and go and find something else to do. This is a work which moves at its own pace, a novel which, while it might be interested in may things, has little time for a reader who isn't prepared to settle down and forget the call of the outside world for a while.
The physical setting of the novel is the key to understanding it, and the filmmaker lays it out for us right at the start:
"Unchecked by hills or mountains, the sunlight in summer occupied the whole extent of the land from dawn till sunset. And in winter the winds and showers sweeping across the great open spaces barely faltered at the few stands of timber meant as shelter for men or animals. I knew that there were great plains of the world that lay for months under snow, but I was pleased that my own district was not one of them. I much preferred to see all year the true configuration of the earth itself and not the false hillocks and hollows of some other element. In any case, I thought of snow (which I had never seen) as too much a part of European and American culture to be appropriate to my own region."
pp.6/7 (Text Classics, 2012)
At times, the novel takes care in its description of the outside environment, the lengthy, unhurried passages contributing to the leisurely pace of the novel.
However, the detailed description is actually at odds with the vague nature of the location of the plains. We know that we are in the interior, but where exactly the filmmaker has ended up is fairly unimportant. One thing we do know is that the plainsmen have a great suspicion for anything which comes from the coast - or "Outer Australia"...
The filmmaker learns of the two great art groups of the region, rivals who debate the nature of the beauty of the plains. However, when a third group attempts to spread its own views, the Horizonites & Haremen unite to drive out this 'foreign' concept:
"They discredited it finally on the simple grounds that it was derived from ideas current in Outer Australia. The plainsmen were not always opposed to borrowings and importations, but in the matter of culture they had come to scorn the seeming barbarisms of their neighbours in the coastal cities and damp ranges. And when the more acute plainsmen had convinced the public that this latest group were drawing on a jumble of the worst kinds of foreign notions, the members of the despised group chose to cross the Great Dividing Range rather than endue the enmity of all thinking plainsmen." (pp.33/4)
This idea of hostility to the big cities and 'Inner Australia' as a true nation might seem far-fetched, but it really is a different world away from the East Coast (Western Australia, for example, the large state on the other coast of the continent, often sees itself as a very different entity to the rest of the country...).
Putting aside the disputes with Outer Australia, though, life passes slowly on the plains, frustratingly so for anyone hoping to get things done. The filmmaker's wait for an audience with the landowners takes much of the first part of the novel, and his days in the landowner's private library (mostly spent gazing out at a restricted view of the plains) pretty much fills up the rest of the book. In fact, the more you think about The Plains, with its nameless characters, the futility of the main character's quest, with a film never to be finished, the more other writers' work comes to mind.
The quiet, ever-changing library, and the odd sense of time passing and yet standing still, definitely has shades of Borges, albeit a much more relaxed Borges, but the sheer futility of much of what happens reminds me unmistakably of Kafka. We mustn't forget that this is Australia, though. While Kafka's protagonists race around, shouting, blustering, hoping to force their way into seeing the right people, Murnane's creation is very much a man of his people. He's happy to take his time - his appointment is in a pub, not a cramped office - and while he's waiting he may as well have a beer or five, as do his interviewers when he finally gets to join them...
The Plains is a beautiful, understated piece of writing, a relatively short book, but one which leaves the reader with a lot to think about. Quite apart from deciding which of the rival camps to side with on the question of the beauty of the plains (does it lie in the vast, endless horizon or the microscopic detail of ears of wheat?), we are asked to contemplate the idea that possibilities are more important than achievements. You see, when things are achieved, the other possibilities disappear (which again hints that the man's film is highly unlikely to be completed...).
The people of the plains go in for their own form of philosophy, one which looks for the meaning of life in a focus on very subjective truths:
"What might not follow, they ask themselves, if there should be nothing more substantial in all our experience than those discoveries that seem too slight to signify anything apart from their own brief occurrence? How might a man reorder his conduct if he could be assured that the worth of a perception, a memory, a supposition, was enhanced rather than diminished by its being inexplicable to others? And what could a man not accomplish, freed from any obligation to search for so-called truths apart from those demonstrated by his search for a truth peculiar to him?" (pp.110/1)
Which is probably a good place to note that any attempt to decipher Murnane's work is probably doomed to failure. As he said in his talk at the Melbourne Writers Festival, nobody could ever come close to understanding what he wants to say through his work and what his novels mean to him...
Still, despite being indecipherable (and virtually plotless), The Plains is a great read, a soothing piece of writing which leaves you vaguely glimpsing a concealed philosophy, but unable to quite discern its contours - and yet you're not really that bothered (this is Australia, after all...). I'm definitely keen to read more of Murnane's work, especially his first book, Tamarisk Row, and his latest, A Million Windows, as they were the ones discussed most in his talk. Outwardly, Murnane and his novels are very Australian, but there's definitely something else waiting to be discovered at the core of his work - if you're just patient enough to wait for it to reveal itself...
Oh, while you're waiting, why not get yourself a cold one? ;)
After my recent review of Le Colonel Chabert, today it's time for the second of my Christmas Humbook selections. Lisa, of ANZ LitLovers LitBlog, chose a couple of Aussie books for me to try, and this post looks at the first of them. The novel is not widely read, but the writer is very well-known...
*****
Patrick White is still Australia's only real Nobel Prize for Literature winner (for me, the South-African import J.M. Coetzee doesn't really count...), and Happy Valley, brought out in the Text Classics series, was his first novel, a book which he refused to allow to be republished during his lifetime. It's a shame because it's a great read, an addition to the body of Australian country literature and an ideal entry into White's work for new readers.
Happy Valley is a small town in country New South Wales, and the story takes place in the mid-to-late 1930s. It used to be a gold-mining boom town, but now it's sparsely populated, a sleepy bush town with little going on. The first few chapters introduce us to the town, and some of its residents, seen through the (cinematic) eyes of a hawk, hovering high overhead. This artistic touch is soon addressed in true Aussie fashion though, as several of the characters think about shooting it down...
In these first few chapters, we meet several pivotal characters. There's a new arrival, farm manager Clem Hagan, brought in to oversee work on the land of the Furlow family, and Doctor Oliver Halliday, bored of marriage and bored of life in Happy Valley. Among the women, we meet potential spinster Alys Browne, and Sidney Furlow, a local heiress, beautiful and cold. And always in the background, the Quongs, descendants of a Chinese immigrant, shopkeepers and silent witnesses to what happens in the town.
On the one hand, Happy Valley is one of those typical tales of the Australian country with its blistering summer heat, isolation, and bushfires. There's a sense familiar to anyone who's read Oz-Lit before. One of the minor characters, Sidney's English suitor, feels completely out of his depth:
"There is something here completely foreign to anything I know, felt Roger Kemble, those hands that touch a different substance, and despising what I touch."
p.167 (Text Classics, 2012)
The reader, however, is in very familiar territory.
White draws a skillful picture of the isolated town, small and run-down:
"Happy Valley became that peculiarly tenacious scab on the body of the brown earth. You waited for it to come away leaving a patch of pinkness underneath. You waited and it did not happen, and because of this you felt there was something in its nature particularly perverse." (p.138)
It's a town of few amusements, just the pub, the weekly picture hall and the annual races, and in a place where everyone knows everyone else, the arrival of a stranger (Hagan) is a big event. What really raises interest though is when bored men and women start to look around for something to distract themselves from the torpor of everyday existence - now infidelity is really interesting...
At the heart of the story are the attempts some characters make to break free of the crushing gravitational pull of the town. Vic Moriarty, the frustrated wife of the sickly local teacher is drawn to bad boy Clem (who also has his eyes fixed elsewhere...). Dr. Halliday, trapped in a loveless marriage with an older woman, is looking for a transfer to Queensland, but is distracted by a blossoming friendship. Alys Browne wants to escape to California, and is waiting for her ship (or her shares) to come in. Many want to leave the town - it's doubtful though whether they'll actually ever manage it...
Happy Valley is a book built around the main love triangles, but there's so much more to enjoy. White creates a great ensemble cast of characters, including the inscrutable Quongs. The family faces subtle (and unsubtle) discrimination, looked down upon by the Anglo residents, tolerated for their use in providing daily goods. Yet they are actually the locals, there from start to finish - the whites are the ones who are simply passing through...
In addition to the interesting plot, the book is also notable for the language used. After the first few introductory chapters, the language becomes more complex, and there is a definite stream-of-consciousness style, with obvious influences. Many passages evoke Woolf, and at the heart of the novel the writing becomes almost Joycean in its confusion:
"The wind is wind is water wind or water white in pockets of the eyes was once a sheep before time froze the plover call alew aloo atingle is the wire that white voice across the plain on thistle thorn the wind pricks face the licked fire the wind flame tossing out distance on a reel." (p.225)
Thoughts intermingle, sentences start and trail off, cut down by new thoughts, only half-expressed... It's not easy to push through at times, but it's always worth it.
As far as I know, there's no paperback version of Happy Valley out yet. Hopefully, it's on its way as it's a fascinating book, and a worthy introduction to a great writer, one more people should try. Don't be fooled by the name of the book though - Happy Valley? Only in the ironic Australian use of the word:
"There never was co-operation in Happy Valley, not even in the matter of living, or you might even say less in the matter of living. In Happy Valley the people existed in spite of each other." (pp.27/8)
Ah, Australia...
I've had a copy of Miles Franklin's classic Australian novel My Brilliant Career on my shelves for about six months now, having previously failed to read a library copy and a free Kindle version, but a recent catalyst finally induced me to pick it up and give it a go. Tom, the amateur reader behind the deceptively-professional Wuthering Expectations, posted twice on it a few weeks ago, and his comments persuaded me that it was time to head out into the bush. Care to join me? Bring a hat, don't forget the sunscreen - oh, and whatever you do, watch where you're walking...
*****
My Brilliant Career is set in the 1890s and narrated by Sybylla Melvyn, a woman looking back at her formative years. The first ten years of her life, spent in the Australian bush riding horses and splashing around in waterholes, turn her into a bit of a tomboy, and when her father decides to move his family and take on a new career as a dairy farmer, she struggles to adapt to her new, dull existence.
Luckily, after several years of drudgery, she is rescued by her grandmother, who brings her back to her home area of Caddagat to live a slightly more refined existence. Here Sybylla once again encounters books, society and men - in particular, the rich, sun-beaten and taciturn landholder Harold Beecham. With a male protagonist whose emotions run deep below his rugged exterior, you could be forgiven for having fleeting thoughts of a Darcy or a Rochester. Sybylla though is no Lizzie or Jane...
Franklin wrote the first version of the book when she was just sixteen, but apart from the odd over-flowery expression it's hard to believe that this is the case. My Brilliant Career is a superb depiction of life as a woman in the late 19th-century, a creature trapped by her gender in a stifling, unsuitable life. The title is a sarcastic one, referring to Sybylla's thoughts on the agony of her lot in life, destined (like her mother) to wear herself to the bone for nothing.
Despite her fiery nature, poor Sybylla has virtually no choice in the direction of her future. Trapped in a poor existence by her father's drunken ineptitude, she is shifted from house to house without ever having a say in matters. If she could just resign herself to her fate, she knows she would be happier; however:
"...I am afflicted with the power of thought, which is a heavy curse. The less a person thinks and inquires regarding the why and the wherefore and the justice of things, when dragging along through life, the happier it is for him, and doubly, trebly so, for her."
p.30 (Text Classics, 2012)
It's not as if she has any great prospect of escape. If she needs any hints as to her probable future, the figures of her exhausted mother and her jilted spinster aunt should give her a glimpse of how she is likely to end up.
Sybylla, however, is not one to compromise. She is a superb character, allegedly plain, but self-evidently intelligent, loving and very ambitious. Like any Austen heroine, she loves her books and her dancing; unlike her English counterparts, she's not averse to more masculine pursuits. She's just as at home on the back of a horse, or in the driver's seat of a carriage, as she is in the ballroom - just don't leave any whips hanging around...
Anyone who enjoys classic English literature will find a lot to like in My Brilliant Career as there are a lot of similarities with novels from the mother country. The daily life inside the houses of the more well-off families is remarkably similar to that in many English novels, and (as mentioned) the importance of literature is just as prominent. A scene where the family holds a feast for all the workers to celebrate the Prince of Wales' birthday is also Hardyesque in its bringing together of all the social groups on the property.
However, this is not my home land, this is my adopted country, and My Brilliant Career, perhaps more than almost any other book I've read, really brings home the fact that Australia is a unique place. Sybylla sets out on searing hot days, under impossibly blue skies, with magpies swooping on the unwary (which is a lot scarier than it sounds - trust me...). Jackaroos abound - not small marsupials but men who work on gigantic cattle farms. The temperature (still measured in fahrenheit in those days) is often over 100 degrees in the shade...
...and even sentences which could have been lifted directly from Austen are unable to escape their Australian influence. If we look at a sentence (which Tom, again, got to first), a quick glance reveals a very Victorian scene:
"Several doors and windows of the long room opened into the garden, and [...] it was delightful to walk amid the flowers and cool oneself between dances." p.208
Austenesque? Absolutely. But the eagle-eyed among you will have noticed the square brackets in the middle of the sentence. So, what exactly has been omitted? Let's look at the full sentence...
"Several doors and
windows of the long room opened into the garden, and, provided one had no fear of snakes, it was
delightful to walk amid the flowers and cool oneself between dances."
p.208
I think we can all agree that as wonderful as Saint Jane's writing can be, her novels really don't contain enough posionous snakes...
All in all, My Brilliant Career is worthy of the hype. It's a great book, precocious but profound, a feminist classic in which the heroine follows her own desires against the expectations of society, her family and the man who loves her. You should read this - you'll probably like it :)
*****
Before I go, I'd just like to make a few notes on the text (no pun intended). Text Publishing is a small press based in Melbourne, and in May this year they brought out a series called Text Classics. The series comprises a few dozen famous Australian books, in a variety of genres, with introductions by celebrity fans of the books. They have distinctive, yellow-based covers, and they cost just AU$12.95 each (with, as far as I can tell, free worldwide delivery). In a country where you virtually need a mortgage to regularly buy books (and where life appears more Americanised every day...) providing affordable, quality, classic Aussie literature is a public service, and one I applaud them for - bravo :) Anyone interested in literature Down Under could do a lot worse than checking out the Text Classics series as their starting point...
