The Slow Natives
- Author: Thea Astley (1925-2004)
- Title: The Slow Natives
- Published: 1965
- Genre: social satire
- Setting: Condamine (Queensland Australia)
- Tone: empathetic as Astely examines the lives…so recognizable to her
- Publication success: this book won the Miles Franklin Award 1965 and
- gained Astely her well-deserved audience in the U.S.
- It was her to be her breakthrough…novel.
Title:
- I choose the image of a family of elephants to represent
- the central characters, the Leversons, in this book.
- …Bernard, Iris and their son Keith.
- Astely revealed how she came across the title of the book.
- It is based on a joke she heard:
- What’s the black stuff between the elephant’s toes?
- Slow natives. (pg 160, Thea Astley: Inventing Her Own Weather)
Plot:
- A suburban couple, Iris and Bernard,
- …have drifted into the shallows of middle-aged boredom.
- Their fourteen-year-old son, Keith is a stranger.
- The boy slips into petty theft…shoplifting.
- This is a portrait of the surface of ordinary life
- …but underneath emotions are rising.
- Astley alternates chapters about Iris, Bernard and Keith with
- …Father Lingard and Sister Matthew.
- They are doubting their religious vocations.
- …Miss Trumper and Miss Paradise .
- Spinsters now in their fifties…life has passed them by.
Book and Astley’s life:
- Astley has used many aspects of
- her family, unstable marriage and life-long struggle with Catholicism.
- Sister Matthew – psychologically unhinged nun – Astley’s Catholic convent education
- If you have ever been taught by those self-effacing Catholic nuns
- you will appreciate Astley’s imagery.
- This brings back memories:
- Favorite Quote: (Sister Matthew with pupil Eva)
- “… gently touching her arm with a force that was not at all physical,
- but held the compulsion that brings mountains to Mahomet.” (pg 52)
- Father Lingard – sexually starved spinster priest = Astley’s brother Phil who was a priest
- Astley felt the church was stealing his time….stealing his life.
- The Leversons are based on her own family = husband Jack and son Ed
- Bernard Leverson is a piano teacher = based on Astely’s music teacher A. Sharman
- Keith Leverson – Astley’s rebellious son = Ed
- Iris Leverson = Thea Astley’s own self-absorbed personality
Characters:
- Keith: desperate need for a father’s firm hand
- Bernard: finally becomes emotionally engaged with son
- …while the boy is unconscious in hospital….he is almost too late.
- Iris: ‘one-liner’s, her smart-arsed cracks
- …relieved the tension in the marriage…but not for long.
- Poor Iris….her adultery had not been a success.
- Husband Bernard did not care and the other one (Gerald) was not tortured.
- Favorite quote:
- “Let someone, anyone, love me, she prayed, burning the toast.”
- Thea Astley is in top-form ….social satire about Condamine Australia!
Conclusion:
- I did not think Astley’s writing could get any better.
- It does!
- After reading Girl With a Monkey (1958), Descant for Gossips (1960)
- and The Well Dressed Explorer (1962)
- …this is the best book so far!
- It won the Miles Franklin Award 1965.
- Astely was asked what is the most difficult part of writing?
- She said writing dialogue that does not sound trivial.
- This book is filled with clever… eggshell brittle dialogue
- …with dazzling metaphors, dense prose.
- Strong point: Astley’s skill in constructing the perfect image with
- an action verb that ties it all up into a neat powerful package!
- Example: …lollipop umbrella’s had their color sucked from them by the sun.
- Example: …along the drooping eyelids the blood pulsed lavender.
- This is a gem!
Read #Thea Astley: here is a list of her books….I plan to read all of them!
- Girl with a Monkey (1958) – READ
- A Descant for Gossips (1960) – READ
- The Well Dressed Explorer (1962) – READ
- The Slow Natives (1965) – READ (breakthrough novel…..Miles Franklin Award 1965)
- A Boat Load of Home Folk (1968)
- The Acolyte (1972) (This was Thea Astley’s favorite book)
- A Kindness Cup (1974)
- An Item from the Late News (1982)
- Beachmasters (1985)
- It’s Raining in Mango (1987)
- Reaching Tin River (1990)
- Vanishing Points (1992)
- Coda (1994)
- The Multiple Effects of Rainshadow (1996)
- Drylands (1999)
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Yes, I know, I really must read more Astley.
Your delight & enthusiasm though is enough to keep me going 😊
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I never would have heard of Thea Astley…if it were not for you! 🙂
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