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3.94 AVERAGE
3.94 AVERAGE
I read this directly after reading the novel also by Leah Purcell.
Wish I'd seen the original production, would have been excellent with these actors.
It's an interesting to compare the different mediums. In some ways I think the play is more of brutal story and is certainly more in the moment without the rich internal dialogues and backstory in the novel. I found the novel far more hopeful and more of a complete story.
I hope this play has many opportunities to be performed and will be looking forward to seeing the film.
Wish I'd seen the original production, would have been excellent with these actors.
It's an interesting to compare the different mediums. In some ways I think the play is more of brutal story and is certainly more in the moment without the rich internal dialogues and backstory in the novel. I found the novel far more hopeful and more of a complete story.
I hope this play has many opportunities to be performed and will be looking forward to seeing the film.
I read this last night in a cosy bed as the rain was lashing at the window and the Southerly wind was being whipped down from the top of the Snowy Mountains.
Set in the High Country in the late 1890s, a pregnant Molly Johnson lives alone with her 4 children while her abusive husband is out droving for months at a time.
She's self-sufficient but it's a challenging life, living so remotely, and there seems to be a number of visitors, not many of them friendly that keep turning up.
It's a wild story and provides a fascinating backstory and great detail to Henry Lawson's original short story and Leah Purcell's award winning play that was first performed in 2016.
Highly recommended.
Set in the High Country in the late 1890s, a pregnant Molly Johnson lives alone with her 4 children while her abusive husband is out droving for months at a time.
She's self-sufficient but it's a challenging life, living so remotely, and there seems to be a number of visitors, not many of them friendly that keep turning up.
It's a wild story and provides a fascinating backstory and great detail to Henry Lawson's original short story and Leah Purcell's award winning play that was first performed in 2016.
Highly recommended.
challenging
dark
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
dark
emotional
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
A powerful read that foregrounds settler colonialism and the impact on Indigenous Australians in the Alpine region of New South Wales and Victoria. It also foregrounds the strength of a woman living alone with her children in a mountain shack. Her oldest child is 12 and he's able to help around the house but there are three other children a bit younger and she is pregnant with another.
From hearing Leah Purcell speaking on the radio recently I feel a strong sense of warmth when it comes to her and her work. I haven't seen the play she wrote and starred in based on this story and I'm really looking forward to the film. I love how the play, book and film speak to each other. The book has interior monologues that can't fit in a film and as books are always more detailed than a film this accompanies it well.
The action is well paced but it's the portrait of Molly Johnson that stands out. There are parts near the start that are a little clunky and the shifting of narrators between first and third don't always ring true but I soon got used to that and the underlying relationships are what hold this together.
Leah Purcell is a gifted storyteller and as the action heats up and as more lives start to come together I found the book hard to put down. I didn't see the end coming and it only serves to add to the power who is Molly Johnson.
Leah Purcell drew on the Henry Lawson short story which I just read right now. She has taken the key elements and extended those out. The racism in Lawson's original story is still there but we have a much broader picture of settler colonial relations and the destruction wrought by settler colonialists.
From hearing Leah Purcell speaking on the radio recently I feel a strong sense of warmth when it comes to her and her work. I haven't seen the play she wrote and starred in based on this story and I'm really looking forward to the film. I love how the play, book and film speak to each other. The book has interior monologues that can't fit in a film and as books are always more detailed than a film this accompanies it well.
The action is well paced but it's the portrait of Molly Johnson that stands out. There are parts near the start that are a little clunky and the shifting of narrators between first and third don't always ring true but I soon got used to that and the underlying relationships are what hold this together.
Leah Purcell is a gifted storyteller and as the action heats up and as more lives start to come together I found the book hard to put down. I didn't see the end coming and it only serves to add to the power who is Molly Johnson.
Leah Purcell drew on the Henry Lawson short story which I just read right now. She has taken the key elements and extended those out. The racism in Lawson's original story is still there but we have a much broader picture of settler colonial relations and the destruction wrought by settler colonialists.
ENGL120
I was filled with tension and anxiety the whole read through. Beautifully written and a harrowing representation of life for women and Indigenous Australians.
I was filled with tension and anxiety the whole read through. Beautifully written and a harrowing representation of life for women and Indigenous Australians.
Brutal but brilliant. Really confronting, doesn't shy away from the horrors and truth of 'settlement', the intersecting experiences of women and Indigenous Australians. Deeply confronting.