Review: Searching for the Secret River
Cover - Searching for the secret river
I have recently read Kate Grenville‘s historical novel The Secret River. You can read my review here.
Straight after finishing the novel I went on to read her follow up book Searching for the Secret River.
In this second book she goes into great detail about how she researched the novel. The story is based upon the life of her great-great-great grandfather, but she took the facts gleaned from family history and extensive research both in London and in Sydney over a five year period and transformed it into fiction. She has used fact as a broad brush in the hands of her imagination and the finished novel is brilliant. It gives the reader a much clearer view of life in the early years of settlement in the young Australian colony.
Searching for the Secret River is a fascinating expose on the thinking processes of one of our leading authors. Grenville takes us on a journey from the first inklings of an idea for a book through to the finished product. At first she was planning a non fiction book but she struck so many obstacles along the way that she changed tack completely, fictionalising it and letting her imagination run. I’m pleased she did.
While she does address some of the issues faced by all writers of fiction, this is not a handbook on writing. Sure, she does explain why she changed from first to third person, but generally it was the research that so intrigued her that she recounts in the first part of the book. Throughout she grapples with her attitudes, and those of the settlers, towards the Aboriginal people who would have lived in the Sydney area during the time in which she sets her novel. She was confronted by some very unsavoury discoveries. The reader of the novel is likewise confronted by some of the events of those days. Australian history is not always the clean, lovely accounts I read as a student many years ago.
While she has drawn from actual historical records, her novel is not another version of history. ‘I was shameless in rifling through research for anything I could use,’ she writes, ‘wrenching it out of its place and adapting it for my own purposes… What I was writing wasn’t real, but it was as true as I could make it.‘ (Grenville p. 210) She has been criticised for her (alleged) misuse of history. I think she has achieved what most other writers struggle with – she has made history come alive for the reader.
Reference:
- Grenville, K, 2007, Searching for the Secret River. WF Howes, Leicester.
Book review: The Secret River by Kate Grenville
The Secret River
I’ve recently read Kate Grenville‘s novel The Secret River on the recommendation of a friend. I can’t recall if I’ve ever read any other works by this prominent Australian author, but will certainly be looking at her other books in the future.
The story begins in London and follows the story of William Thornhill, a boatman on the Thames. He is involved in a misadventure which lands him in jail and sentenced to hang. Fortunately his wife’s family has connections, and his sentence is commuted to transportation to Australia as a convict ‘for the term of his natural life.’ His wife and young family are allowed to travel on the same convict ship, but as free settlers in the new penal colony at Sydney.
The story grabs the reader as Thornhill and his family struggle to survive. After some years he gains his freedom. Through hard work and many setbacks they eventually establish a farm they think of as their own. The indigenous population see things much differently and the inevitable conflict arises. This is a dark and often tragic part of recent Australian history, the ramifications of which we are still attempting to work through.
Grenville has drawn some memorable characters, especially in Thornhill, his wife Sal and her longing to some day return home to London, and some of the minor characters living near them. Their daily endeavours are well documented, set against the ever present strangeness of the unfamiliar landscape. Grenville also carefully plots the growing problem they had with the local Darug people who had lived here at one with the environment for millennia.
Interestingly, this story was inspired by the author’s family history. Her great-great-great grandfather was Solomon Wiseman after whom Wisemans Ferry, near modern Sydney, is named. While the novel is fiction, the author has drawn heavily upon historical records of the day, including those of her family. Thus we have in the novel a blurring of the line between historical fact and an author’s imagination as expressed in the fiction of the story.
This blurring resonates with what I am attempting to do with my own work in progress, a children’s novel set in Nepal which draws on actual historical events.
The Secret River is an important work by a highly acclaimed Australian author. It has rightly won many awards, including:
- Winner, Commonwealth Writers’ Prize 2006
- Winner, NSW Premier’s Literary award 2006
- Shortlisted, Man Booker Prize, 2006.
Reference:
Grenville, K 2005. The Secret River. Text, Melbourne.
Writing about hidden treasures
Some writers complain that although they want to write, they just don’t know what to write about. In another life (as a classroom teacher) I constantly heard this complaint.
I rarely have this problem. In fact, I usually have far too many things to write about. My problem is choosing which one to write about first.
There are hidden treasures lurking everywhere. You just have to open your eyes to see the possibilities for writing that can crowd in upon you every day.
Start with everyday objects and let your imagination soar:
- Make a list of twenty (or 50 or…) objects in your bedroom. Now think about one object and how it came into your life. Change this to a really bizarre story. For example, the photo on the dresser is not your mother; it is the photo of a distant relative who was married to a famous explorer or an infamous mass murderer.
- Describe three objects in the room where you are sitting now. Now pick just one of them and imagine you dug it up in the garden. How did it get into your garden, and how is it now influencing your life?
- Look in the refrigerator. Take note of one thing and write about how it came to be there. Give it a life of its own, telling the story of it existence in its own voice.
- Go outside and sit in the garden. Write about the one thing in your garden you really like (or absolutely detest). Write a conversation (or argument) between you and the object.
- Walk to the nearest park with notebook and pencil. Describe one person you passed on the way. Note how they are dressed – and change their attire into something very usual, like a grandma wearing pirate clothing. Use you imagination and let her sit with you to tell her story.
- Visit your nearest shopping center with a notebook and pen and find a seat. Pick out two people in the crowd. Try to imagine what they are saying. Give them new lives, new identities. Let them tell you their story.
- Find an old magazine or newspaper and open it at random, picking out a photo at random. Use the photo as a starting point to your story. For example, if it is a photo of a young man advertising deodorant, imagine him doing something adventurous, or heroic or courageous. Bring the photo – and the subject – to life.
Story ideas are lurking everywhere; you just have to have eyes to see them.
Good writing.
Welcome to the dark side
Today’s quote:
“Everyone is a moon and has a dark side which he never shows to anybody.”
Mark Twain
Mark Twain has touched on the very essence of what it is to be human. Yes, we do all have a ‘dark side’ – that part of our nature that rarely, if ever, sees the light of day. We may well be acutely aware of this flaw but most of us are clever actors able to hide this face from public view. Jesus, in his criticism of the religious leaders of his day, called them hypocrites because they appeared as white-washed tombs which look okay on outside, but are actually full of dead men’s bones on the inside.
As writers we can tap into this deep well of darkness. We can let the protagonist have a flaw which other characters know nothing about. This dark side can be either a motivator stirring his resolve, or it can be a burden, an obstacle preventing success.
This character flaw can be shown in various ways: through actions, through internal thoughts, through uncharacteristic responses to other characters, through subtle hints which other characters do not understand and so on.
Possibly one of the best known example is that of Luke Skywalker in the Star Wars stories. All the way through the last three movies he battles his fear. On many occasions he is urged to give in to the dark side, to allow his fears to breed hatred.
It is certainly worth digging deep within this rich vein of conflict within the nature of your main character, exploring it and then exploiting it for all its worth.
Good writing.