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This image has been sourced from online.
y separately published work icon Voss : A Novel single work   novel  
Issue Details: First known date: 1957... 1957 Voss : A Novel
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'Set in nineteenth-century Australia, Voss is the story of the secret passion between an explorer and a naïve young woman. Although they have met only a few times, Voss and Laura are joined by overwhelming, obsessive feelings for each other. Voss sets out to cross the continent. As hardships, mutiny and betrayal whittle away his power to endure and to lead, his attachment to Laura gradually increases. Laura, waiting in Sydney, moves through the months of separation as if they were a dream and Voss the only reality.

'From the careful delineation of Victorian society to the sensitive rendering of hidden love to the stark narrative of adventure in the Australian desert, Patrick White's novel is a work of extraordinary power and virtuosity.'

Source: Random House Books (Sighted 21/09/2012)

Exhibitions

6681414
18005741
18005672

Adaptations

y separately published work icon Voss : Opera in Two Acts After the Novel by Patrick White David Malouf , Richard Meale (composer), Grosvenor Place : Australian Music Centre , 1980-1989 Z272889 1980-1989 single work musical theatre opera

Voss was adapted into an opera by author David Malouf and composer Richard Meale. It was first performed by the Australian Opera in Adelaide, March 1986.

Reading Australia

Reading Australia

This work has Reading Australia teaching resources.

Notes

  • Dedication: For Marie d'Estournelles de Constant
  • In a letter to Hu Wenzhong, White refers to a Russian edition, but this has not been traced.

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • New York (City), New York (State),
      c
      United States of America (USA),
      c
      Americas,
      :
      Viking ,
      1957 .
      person or book cover
      Extent: 442p.
      Reprinted: 1974
      Note/s:
      • First published in August 1957. Reprinted twice.
    • Toronto, Ontario,
      c
      Canada,
      c
      Americas,
      :
      Macmillan ,
      1957 .
      image of person or book cover 4641410290431925726.jpg
      This image has been sourced from online.
      Extent: 442p.
    • Harmondsworth, Middlesex,
      c
      England,
      c
      c
      United Kingdom (UK),
      c
      Western Europe, Europe,
      :
      Mitcham, Blackburn - Mitcham - Vermont area, Melbourne - East, Melbourne, Victoria,: Penguin ,
      1960 .
      image of person or book cover 8398269839219201875.jpg
      This image has been sourced from online (Modern Classics reprint)
      Extent: 448p.
      Note/s:
      • Reprinted twenty-one times by 1993.
      • Australian issue 1974.
    • New York (City), New York (State),
      c
      United States of America (USA),
      c
      Americas,
      :
      Avon Books ,
      1975 .
      Extent: 445p.
    • London,
      c
      England,
      c
      c
      United Kingdom (UK),
      c
      Western Europe, Europe,
      :
      Jonathan Cape ,
      1980 .
      Extent: 478p.
      ISBN: 022401773X
    • London,
      c
      England,
      c
      c
      United Kingdom (UK),
      c
      Western Europe, Europe,
      :
      Vintage UK ,
      1994 .
      person or book cover
      Extent: 478p.
      ISBN: 0099324717
    • Sydney, New South Wales,: Vintage Australia , 2012 .
      person or book cover
      Source: Publisher's website
      Extent: 464p.
      Edition info: Vintage Classic edition
      Note/s:
      • Publication date: 01/10/2012
      ISBN: 9781742756882
Alternative title: Voss : Roman
Language: German
    • Reinbek,
      c
      Germany,
      c
      Western Europe, Europe,
      :
      Rowohlt ,
      1973 .
      image of person or book cover 181305573260414968.jpg
      This image has been sourced from online.
      Extent: 450p.
      ISBN: 3499117606
    • Leipzig,
      c
      Germany,
      c
      Western Europe, Europe,
      :
      Reclam ,
      1987 .
      person or book cover
      Extent: 470p.
      ISBN: 3379000892

Other Formats

  • Also braille and sound recording.

Works about this Work

Uluru : A Rock That Plagues Australia’s Conscience Paul Daley , 2021 single work column
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 24 May 2021;

'Mark McKenna’s short, elegant book Return to Uluru gazes inwards to the continental interior, metaphor for a nation’s yearning.'

Nothing to Be Done Brenda Walker , 2020 single work column
— Appears in: The Times Literary Supplement , 21 February 2020; (p. 24-25)
What I’m Reading Fiona Hile , 2019 single work column
— Appears in: Meanjin Online 2019;
y separately published work icon Voss : An Australian Geographical and Literary Exploration Elena Ungari , Berne New York (City) : Peter Lang , 2019 20916361 2019 multi chapter work criticism

'This study of Voss by the Anglo-Australian Patrick White analyses the historical novel, set in the 1850s and concerning Voss’s exploration of the interior of Australia, as a parable of the writer’s exploration of the Australian historical, social and cultural context of the 1950s. The study employs a variety of critical apparatus including a post-structuralist and postcolonial approach, which also encompasses linguistics, sociolinguistics and comparative studies. This multi-level critical aid allows the examination of four levels of exploration utilised by the author.

'Following an analysis of the protagonist’s geographical movement into the desert and his personal transformation, the study moves on to an exploration of the narrative itself. It explores how the novel becomes subject to change, absorbing and contesting a variety of literary genres ranging from the ‘chronicle’ to the parable. Through this multi-level approach, the study demonstrates the variety of readings the novel stimulates and displays its rich intertextual and subtextual elements and links.' (Publication summary)

Australien Russell McDougall , 2019 single work criticism
— Appears in: Verdenslitteraturer : Introduktion til litteraturen uden for Europa 2019; (p. 253-284)
[Review] Voss Peter Boxall , 2006 single work review
— Appears in: 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die 2006; (p. 509)

— Review of Voss : A Novel Patrick White , 1957 single work novel
The Books That Made Us 1995 single work review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 19-20 August 1995; (p. rev 1-2)

— Review of My Brother Jack : A Novel George Johnston , 1964 single work novel ; The Lucky Country Donald Horne , 1964 single work non-fiction ; Joe Wilson and His Mates Henry Lawson , 1901 selected work short story ; My Brilliant Career Miles Franklin , 1901 single work novel ; Monkey Grip Helen Garner , 1977 single work novel ; Voss : A Novel Patrick White , 1957 single work novel ; The Fortunes of Richard Mahony Henry Handel Richardson , 1917 single work novel
Novelists and Conventions Vincent Buckley , 1958 single work review
— Appears in: Prospect , June vol. [1] no. 1 1958; (p. 21-22)

— Review of Seedtime Vance Palmer , 1957 single work novel ; Voss : A Novel Patrick White , 1957 single work novel
'Seedtime' and 'Voss' Marjorie Barnard , 1958 single work review
— Appears in: Meanjin , Autumn vol. 17 no. 1 1958; (p. 94-100)

— Review of Seedtime Vance Palmer , 1957 single work novel ; Voss : A Novel Patrick White , 1957 single work novel
[Review] Voss 1957 single work review
— Appears in: The Times Literary Supplement , 13 December 1957; (p. 753)

— Review of Voss : A Novel Patrick White , 1957 single work novel
The Marriage of the Mind and the Cosmos in Patrick White's Voss : An Indian Perspective K. Chellappan , 2002 single work criticism
— Appears in: The Literary Criterion , vol. 37 no. 2 2002; (p. 44-53)
Inner Struggles Thomas Keneally , 2002-2003 single work criticism
— Appears in: The Bulletin , 17 December-14 January vol. 120 no. 6355 2002-2003; (p. 38-39)
Paradoxes of Non- Existence : Questions of Time, Metaphor and the Materialities of Cultural Traditions in Wilson Harris's Discussions of Australian Literary Texts Brigitta Olubas , 2002 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australian Cultural History , no. 21 2002; (p. 81-88, notes 122)
Olubas examines the way in which Caribbean writer Wilson Harris's 'account of national traditions and of the national and cultural provenances and imaginitive inheritances of particular writers directs attention ... toward broader, unexpected imaginitive, aesthetic and representational traditions, explicitly colonial, often violent, which yet enhance our readings of the complex high points of national literary traditions and figures ... [and] presents us with other ways to take up the relations between texts, within as well as across (national) cultural traditions' (p. 88).
Containing Continents: The Moralized Landscapes of Conrad, Greene, White and Harris Mark Williams , 1985 single work criticism
— Appears in: Kunapipi , vol. 7 no. 1 1985; (p. 34-45)
y separately published work icon Postcolonial Literature from Three Continents : Tutuola, H. D., Ellison, and White Judith L. Tabron , New York (City) : Peter Lang , 2003 Z1061297 2003 multi chapter work criticism Publisher's abstract: 'How can we read literatures from other cultures? The metaphors of fractal geometry can help us think about the complexity of the cultural situation of a text or an author. Postcolonial Literature from Three Continents identifies four primary themes common to postcolonial texts - technology, memory, language, and geography - and examines them in relationship to four texts from Nigeria, the United States, and Australia so that we see both the colonized and colonizing positions of these works. The quartet of texts are Amos Tutola's The Palm-Wine Drinkard, H. D.'s Helen in Egypt , Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man, and Patrick White's Voss.'
Last amended 15 Mar 2024 10:37:48
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