AustLit logo

AustLit

image of person or book cover 9043846389106193842.jpg
Image courtesy of publisher's website.
y separately published work icon An Accommodating Spouse single work   novel  
Issue Details: First known date: 1999... 1999 An Accommodating Spouse
The material on this page is available to AustLit subscribers. If you are a subscriber or are from a subscribing organisation, please log in to gain full access. To explore options for subscribing to this unique teaching, research, and publishing resource for Australian culture and storytelling, please contact us or find out more.

AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'The Professor is married to Hazel, a diligent and generous (but rather plain) woman. She is so close to her twin, Chloe, that both women live under one roof with the Professor.

'Back from an overseas trip come their daughters — triplets — ready to celebrate their twenty-first birthday. Family life in the otherwise peaceful house swells to a chaotic crescendo on the evening of the party, as the Professor feels the tender sting of his wife's accommodating ways.'

Source: Publisher's blurb (Modern Classics ed.).

Exhibitions

18005853
18005672

Notes

  • Epigraphs: Blame no one. Blame, if you must, the human situation. (W. H. Auden); The unexamined life is not worth living (Socrates)
  • Author's note: An earlier version of the text pp. 38-79 was first published as 'An Intellectual Father' in the New Yorker 29 July 1996.

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • Ringwood, Ringwood - Croydon - Kilsyth area, Melbourne - East, Melbourne, Victoria,: Viking , 1999 .
      image of person or book cover 9043846389106193842.jpg
      Image courtesy of publisher's website.
      Extent: 252 [3]p.p.
      Reprinted: 2000
      ISBN: 0670888931
    • Ringwood, Ringwood - Croydon - Kilsyth area, Melbourne - East, Melbourne, Victoria,: Penguin , 2000 .
      image of person or book cover 1107914895078937677.jpg
      This image has been sourced from online.
      Extent: 255p.
      ISBN: 0140288171
    • Camberwell, Camberwell - Kew area, Melbourne - Inner South, Melbourne, Victoria,: Penguin , 2010 .
      image of person or book cover 7472086518035471100.jpg
      Image courtesy of publisher's website.
      Extent: 1v.p.
      ISBN: 9781742530291, 174253029X
      Series: Penguin Modern Classics series - publisher

Other Formats

  • Braille and sound recording.
  • Large print.

Works about this Work

Elizabeth Jolley's Late Work Delys Bird , 2009 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australian Literary Studies , vol. 24 no. 1 2009; (p. 121-133)

The article looks at the last four novels by Jolley which were 'somewhat neglected by scholars'. Taken as a body of 'late work' with some evidence of 'late style' (Edward Said), 'might give them a more acknowledged place in a critical history of Jolley's writing' (122).

Acts of Noticing : A Consideration of Some Recent Australian Fiction Carmel MacDonald-Grahame , 2000 single work review
— Appears in: Westerly , November vol. 45 no. 2000; (p. 23-36)

— Review of The Red Heart Rosie Scott , 1999 selected work essay autobiography ; Untold Tales David Malouf , 1999 selected work short story ; Dream Stuff David Malouf , 2000 selected work short story ; Blue : A Novel Ken Spillman , 1999 single work novel ; Freedom Highway Nigel Krauth , 1999 single work novel ; The Chelsea Manifesto : A Novel Bruce L. Russell , 1999 single work novel ; Painted Words 1999 anthology short story poetry ; Liv : A Novel Morgan Yasbincek , 2000 single work novel ; Hidden from View Richard Harland , 1999 single work novel ; Benang : From the Heart Kim Scott , 1999 single work novel ; Drylands : A Book for the World's Last Reader Thea Astley , 1999 single work novel ; An Accommodating Spouse Elizabeth Jolley , 1999 single work novel ; Neap Tide Dorothy Hewett , 1999 single work novel ; Isobel on the Way to the Corner Shop Amy Witting , 1999 single work novel ; Poe's Cat Brenda Walker , 1999 single work novel ; Playing Madame Mao Lau Siew Mei , 2000 single work novel ; The Hunter Julia Leigh , 1999 single work novel ; The Australian Fiance Simone Lazaroo , 2000 single work novel
Untitled Maureen Bettle , 1999 single work review
— Appears in: Redoubt , no. 28 1999; (p. 142-143)

— Review of An Accommodating Spouse Elizabeth Jolley , 1999 single work novel
Life's Anvil Sally Morrison , 1999 single work review
— Appears in: The Australian's Review of Books , October vol. 4 no. 9 1999; (p. 18-19)

— Review of An Accommodating Spouse Elizabeth Jolley , 1999 single work novel
Lust and Marriage Liam Davison , 1999 single work review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 16-17 October 1999; (p. 15)

— Review of An Accommodating Spouse Elizabeth Jolley , 1999 single work novel
If He Were a Carpenter...a Sneaky Sort of Hit Rosemary O'Grady , 1999 single work review
— Appears in: The Courier-Mail , 25 September 1999; (p. 7)

— Review of An Accommodating Spouse Elizabeth Jolley , 1999 single work novel
An Unorthodox Coupling Claudia Hyles , 1999 single work review
— Appears in: The Canberra Times , 2 October 1999; (p. 23)

— Review of An Accommodating Spouse Elizabeth Jolley , 1999 single work novel
Double-Dipping Doppelgangers Selina Samuels , 1999 single work review
— Appears in: The Bulletin , 12 October vol. 117 no. 6195 1999; (p. 110)

— Review of An Accommodating Spouse Elizabeth Jolley , 1999 single work novel
Exhilarating Romp A. P. Riemer , 1999 single work review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , October no. 215 1999; (p. 29-30)

— Review of An Accommodating Spouse Elizabeth Jolley , 1999 single work novel
A Gaze Fixed Within Katharine England , 1999 single work review
— Appears in: The Advertiser , 9 October 1999; (p. 19)

— Review of An Accommodating Spouse Elizabeth Jolley , 1999 single work novel
Elizabeth Jolley's Late Work Delys Bird , 2009 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australian Literary Studies , vol. 24 no. 1 2009; (p. 121-133)

The article looks at the last four novels by Jolley which were 'somewhat neglected by scholars'. Taken as a body of 'late work' with some evidence of 'late style' (Edward Said), 'might give them a more acknowledged place in a critical history of Jolley's writing' (122).

Last amended 25 Nov 2019 15:42:45
X