AustLit
Texts
-
y
The Secret River
Melbourne
:
Text Publishing
,
2005
Z1194031
2005
single work
novel
historical fiction
(taught in 69 units)
'In 1806 William Thornhill, a man of quick temper and deep feelings, is transported from the slums of London to New South Wales for the term of his natural life. With his wife Sal and their children he arrives in a harsh land he cannot understand.
'But the colony can turn a convict into a free man. Eight years later Thornhill sails up the Hawkesbury to claim a hundred acres for himself.
'Aboriginal people already live on that river. And other recent arrivals - Thomas Blackwood, Smasher Sullivan and Mrs Herring - are finding their own ways to respond to them.
'Thornhill, a man neither better nor worse than most, soon has to make the most difficult choice of his life.
'Inspired by research into her own family history, Kate Grenville vividly creates the reality of settler life, its longings, dangers and dilemmas. The Secret River is a brilliantly written book, a groundbreaking story about identity, belonging and ownership.' (From the publisher's website.)
Degrees
Description
This unit focuses on the topic of law in/and literature, which it explores through a range of literary and filmic texts and through literary theory. Students will read a range of works with a legal inflection, and investigate them by applying concepts drawn from philosophy and literary theory, including judgment and genre. They will study novels, poetry, philosophy, and extracts from Hansard, judgments and other dicta with the aim of understanding how law and literature intertwine. Is it possible to write or to read outside generic and other social conventions?
Supplementary Texts
To Kill A Mockingbird by Lee, Harper: , Mandarin 1989.
Poetic Justice: The Literary Imagination and Public Life by Nussbaum, Martha C.: , Beacon Press 1997.
Other Details
Offered in:
2009
Levels:
Undergraduate
Coordinator:
Categories:
Homepage
