We of the Never Never by Jeannie Gunn
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
Blurb from Goodreads
An Australian classic. Depicts the enduring hardships of life in the Australian outback and the battles against sexist and racial prejudices.
My review
One of the things I tried to do for this challenge was to read a number of books I have been meaning to read for some time. We of the Never Never was one such book. Because it is an Australian classic from the early 20th century, I expected to find parts of it confronting, and in that, I was not disappointed.
A quick precis: the book is a memoir of the author’s first year on the Elsey, a station in the Northern Territory, several days’ journey (by the modes of transport then available) from Katherine. She is there because she has just married the Elsey’s manager, referred to in the book as “the Maluka” (this is later explained to be a name given to him by the Aboriginal people they have contact with and is, at least, so the author tells us, untranslateable). She is the only non-Aboriginal woman on the Elsey. She tells the story of her journey from Darwin to the Elsey early in the Wet season, and goes on to narrate other episodes, including staffing difficulties, the completion of the homestead and trips out on the station.
The book is a product of its time, and much of what I expected to, and did, find confronting is a reflection of that. The best example of this is the author’s attitude towards race and class. She – or, at least, her persona as narrator – for the most part likes the people she finds on the Elsey, whether they are Black, white or Chinese (the cooks), but her attitude towards all of them is very plainly that of the lady of the manor towards the peasants in the village. Even when describing situations in which another person knows more than she does, her tone is patronising and condescending. This is most obvious in relation to her attitude towards the Aboriginal people she describes. There is no acknowledgement that she is discussing people who come from a cultural background entirely unlike hers, who have a different set of values to hers. Rather, she judges them as if her values are the only possible standard, and finds them lacking and childlike. There is a considerable degree of the “noble savage” myth in her perception of them, and a total lack of understanding of the great injustice that had already been done to them, which was continuing, and to which she contributed. I found this jarring and insulting.
I also found the author’s attitude to gender roles troubling, although once again, I can understand it to be a product of the time. She readily accepts her position as the (relatively) cosseted sole white woman, and all that goes with that. That said, she shows a willingness to chip in that belies her princess-like status to some extent, and one might wonder how much of the avowed compliance with gender roles was exaggerated for the audience.
Finally, while the author acknowledges many of the hardships, difficulties and dangers faced by people living on a remote station in the early twentieth century, the book as a whole still seems to me to romanticise that life to a significant extent.
Despite my criticisms, Mrs Gunn wrote clearly and in a manner generally easy to follow, although, because of the pseudonyms she uses for many characters (particularly the white stockmen), it can be easy to get them confused. This perhaps contributes to the classist overtones of the book. Similarly, she refers to her husband as “the Maluka” from the beginning of the book, but the explanation does not come until about a third of the way in.
We of the Never Never is worth reading for two reasons. First, it is a book by a woman about a woman’s life in a situation about which we know comparatively little (especially as it applied to women). Secondly, and more importantly, it gives some insight (although not, perhaps, the insight the author intended) into attitudes of the day in relation to race and gender, especially the former, and the atrocities committed under the guiding light of those attitudes. This helps us to understand how far we have to go in trying to redress those wrongs.
This is a review for the 2012 Australian Women Writers Challenge. You can see my full list of books here. You can find a full list of my reviews, and other posts relevant to the challenge, here.
An excellent and thoughtful review. Thanks for sharing it
Thanks.
Thanks for this review – very interesting. I wonder what feeling for the land, if any, there is in this book? I’ve never seen the film that was made of it in the 70s and am curious as to how it compares. In some ways Australian films have powerful advantages in contrasting feelings about the land between settlers and indigenous people – Picnic at Hanging Rock, Walkabout, The Tracker, One Night the Moon, Rabbit Proof Fence, etc.
I haven’t read the book but on the subject of aboriginal history, it is hidden. I didn’t find out until I had left university about the massacre at Conniston Station in 1929. There were people white and black that witnessed the genocide stil alive at the time.
Thanks for your review. This book floated round in my childhood as a classic I was told I should read and never did. I wonder how it compares to Katherine Susannah Pritchard’s Coonardoo which I loved when I read it at uni years ago?
(I’m visiting this blog as part of AWW on Wednesdays, where participants in the challenge are encouraged to visit other participants’ blogs and comment on reviews.)
Thanks all.
Just a blog note – please capitalise the “A” of “Aboriginal” (this post explains why). Thanks. (This is Wallaby – come for the books, stay for the social justice!)
To answer Claire’s question, Mrs Gunn has some feeling for the Elsey and the Never Never, but, at least as expressed in the book, to my mind it is enormously romanticised. That said, it’s worth keeping in mind that (I suspect) the book was written with a particular audience in mind and to tell a particular story – and also when the author was new to the place. I’m deeply skeptical as to how similar the real author was to her persona. It may well be that the real author (ie who she really was) had a less romanticised view, especially after a few years!
She didn’t try to describe the feeling of the Aboriginal people of the area for the land, and I rather suspect she had no idea about any such thing. Which brings me to the idea of comparison. I think we have to be SO careful. Most of what has been written about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ feeling for the land, including most of your examples, has been written by white people. As such, it is probably wrong (and talk about romanticisation – and mysticisation, for that matter!), or at the very least, missing much of the nuance.
I am not at all qualified to attempt a comparison, but for anyone who wants to do it, I have two comments. First, the comparison should not be made without some pretty deep reading of and listening to (where accessible and permitted) voices of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. If you want literature, Carpentaria by Alexis Wright is an excellent starting point. We also need to remember how much is lost and, as Sean points out, hidden.
Secondly, in conducting the comparison, it must be borne steadily in mind that it would be like comparing apples with, say chocolate-coated licorice bullets. Not saying it can’t be done, but it’s not a simple head-to-head comparison.
Thanks Jo. Now I feel the perils of trying to leave a post that says something other than ‘nice review’ at 11pm. I think my use of the word ‘comparison’ was ill-judged and I retract it. I think what I really meant is that film is well-placed to capture a sense of the numinous in the Australian landscape and, more accurately, represent some of the growth and change of settler feelings about the land. The title We of the Never Never seems to promise something along these lines but doesn’t sound, from what you say, all that illuminating.
There’s a lot more that could be said about the way texts and films like Picnic at Hanging Rock assume a kind of hidden essence and power in the land which may or may not be accessed in different ways by Aboriginal people (while not presuming to depict this) but I’m not even going to attempt to go there now. Nor am I saying such texts depict anything other than projections. But those projections are an important part of our history and the change in the way these are shown tells us a great deal.
Yes, from what you say, the film does a much better job!
I agree wholeheartedly with this. It’s one of the reasons I wanted to read, and, having read, review, this book for the challenge.
I’d never heard of this, but it sounds like it’s worth a go – thanks for the review :)
[...] (3) Mrs Aeneas Gunn: We of the Never Never (Genre: Memoir/Australian Classic) A book of its time, worth reading to understand ideas of the time, but beware of a modern reaction to such ideas (especially in relation to race). (Full review here.) [...]
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