AustLit

'Patrick White's fifth novel, Voss (1957), has long been gathering about itself the status of icon. However, the hermeneutic processes and the interpretations that have fed this iconicity are still open to debate. Sidney Nolan's famous black-and-white sketch of Voss, appearing first on the front cover of the 1960 edition, is haunting in its depiction of the solid, dapper, bespectacled German man equipping himself for the journey. Equally, and ironically, the sketch is minimalist, hinting at the unknowableness of this foreign man with his slightly different hat. While it suggests that the explorer possesses a sturdiness and control — the trim beard (though seen as scraggy by Laura), the neat shirt buttoned to the collar, the sense of efficiency if not indomitability about the figure with his hands clasped behind — it also suggests that he is dis-placed, not all-knowing, perhaps myopic. The figure in the novel, and in Nolan's hands, is both substance and ghost, knowing and unknowing, earthed and out of place.' (Introduction)