The earlier books that I have read by Australian author Elizabeth Jolley, while a bit more boisterous in some ways than the works of her contemporaries in England during the period (Beryl Bainbridge, Penelope Lively, Barbara Pym, Muriel Spark, Alice Thomas Ellis), seem to fit comfortably into the niche occupied by these other, better known authors, despite Jolley’s unconventional (and some might say outrageous) private life. With Foxybaby (1985), which follows Mr. Scobie (1983)… and Miss Peabody (1984)…, however, Jolley permanently separates herself from her peers back in England, writing a book in which nothing is sacred, with characters who are sometimes crazy, usually self-absorbed, unashamedly venal, and often bawdy. She is realistic, if not enthusiastic, in her depiction of sex in all its variations as salve for the souls of the lonely and the sometimes bored. Nothing about this book is dainty or subtle. Elizabeth Jolley is obviously having great fun taking advantage of the freer, more forgiving attitudes of Australia as she creates this over-the-top novel, filled with wild characters who “let it all hang out.”
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Through flashbacks, an aging surfer, Brucie Pike (“Pikelet”), relives his coming-of-age on the west coast of Australia in the 1960s and 1970s. A lonely boy leading a solitary life, he finds a companion, if not friend, in Ivan Loon (“Loonie”), with whom he shares his love of extreme surfing. “How strange it was,” Pikelet remarks, “to see men do something beautiful. Something pointless and elegant, as though nobody saw and cared.” But the beauty of surfing quickly yields in importance to its excitement and its increasingly dangerous thrills. “There was never any doubt about the primary thrill of surfing, the huge body-rush we got flying down the line with the wind in our ears. We didn’t know what endorphins were, but we quickly understood how narcotic the feeling was, and how addictive it became; from day one I was stoned from just watching,” Pikelet declares. Eventually, however, Pikelet begins to question the relationship between excitement, thrills, risk, and death and what maturity really means. In spare prose which uses some of the most vivid action verbs ever included in a novel, Winton tells an exciting story which makes the seductive thrills of surfing comprehensible to the non-surfer, while showing how his characters discover what makes men humans and ultimately what makes life worth living.
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Australian Patrick White’s genius for story-telling is on full display in this big,old-fashioned saga filled with intriguing characters exploring the difficult terrain of their inner lives. For a number of characters, all male, that personal inner journey is also part of a daring adventure they make into the interior of Australia in the mid-nineteenth century, an area previously unexplored by the white people who have recently discovered this continent. The female characters in Sydney during this same period have a far more difficult time exploring their inner natures, even in the unlikely event that they might be interested in doing so. Here, the women are very much a product of their upbringing in the early years of Queen Victoria’s reign. As the daughters and wives of successful merchants or entrepreneurs, their educations have been in the social graces far more than in academic learning as they ready themselves for their perceived roles in society as the wives of successful men and mothers of a new generation of Australian gentry. The novel is satisfying on every level, thematically, historically, and emotionally, and the characters are memorable. His descriptions are unparalleled, especially in the clever, often satiric presentations of some of the more unpleasant characters, introduced only briefly.
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Posted in 9-2012 Reviews, Australia, Book Club Suggestions, England, Humor, Satire, Absurdity, Literary, Psychological study, Social and Political Issues on Dec 4th, 2012
Author Elizabeth Jolley, whose portraits of elderly characters are unparalleled in their sensitivity and in the sly amusement she brings to their creation, gives life to Dorothy Peabody – or as much life as this quiet, fearful, and unimaginative woman can be said to possess, until that moment in which her life suddenly takes wing through her ongoing correspondence with author Diana Hopewell. Jolley also creates additional, vibrant and often surprising characters, also middle-aged single women, who are the protagonists of the new novel-in-progress which she shares in her correspondence with Miss Peabody. As the point of view moves back and forth between Miss Peabody’s life in Weybridge, outside of London, and Diana Hopewell’s novel-in-progress, which takes place in a polite boarding school in western Australia, Elizabeth Jolley keeps the humor and surprise at a high level, while also commenting on the nature of writing and the role of the novelist. With her wry, often poignant descriptions, and the ability to reveal her characters’ deepest yearnings through subtle and beautifully developed scenes and dialogue, Elizabeth Jolley is a writer of formidable talents and remarkable insights. Outstanding novel!
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The Bat, Norwegian author Jo Nesbo’s earliest of his nine Harry Hole mysteries, is intriguing for many reasons, not least for the growth it shows in Nesbo’s narrative and stylistic talents. Harry has been sent to Australia to help the murder investigation of a young women from Australia who was working at a local bar when she was killed. An attractive blonde, she had been fending off advances from her strange bartender; avoiding her even stranger landlord and his vicious “Tasmanian Devil” of a dog; and spending her nights with a man known to have many connections to the drug world. As the police investigate, it becomes clear that they may be looking for a serial killer obsessed with blonde women. Harry’s partner here is an Aborigine who had been a boxer, and Nesbo reveals much about Aborigine culture, their myths and legends, beliefs, and value system. Though the author is describing a fascinating culture, these digressions, unfortunately, do not advance the action and feel added on to the story. The novel occasionally resembles a travelogue, with each trip to a new part of Sydney or outside it described in vivid detail, though Nesbo does provide enough blood and thunder to keep readers reading, even as they may wonder where the sometimes rambling plot is going. Worth reading if you are already familiar with the series.
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