AustLit

'This paper pays critical attention to the work of Chris Womersley, a contemporary Australian author who, despite winning several awards and being shortlisted for others, remains relatively unknown to the non-Australian reading public. The close reading of Womersley’s novel Bereft undertaken here explores the traumatic impact of horrific events on both the personal, familial level and the broader historical frame. Well-established trauma theories will be rehearsed for the benefit of readers less familiar with this zone of inquiry; these theories lend themselves fruitfully to an allegorical interpretation of Womersley’s novel. Contrary to what some critics claim, literature still has the power to articulate what has often been deemed ‘unutterable’, and, indeed, can contribute to exorcizing the individual and collective traumas of our ‘wounded’ or traumatized times – at the very least by embodying and implicitly arguing for individual and cultural ethical stances and processes of healing that encourage socio-political transformation.' (Publication abstract)