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The Alphabet of Light and Dark by Danielle
Wood. Allen & Unwin, Crows Nest, NSW, 2003. ISBN:
1 74114 065 X. RRP: $21.95. |
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What
is it about Tasmania that makes its literature so exclusively
maudlin? From the melancholy Sound of One Hand Clapping
to the disturbing revelations of The Fatal Shore,
books set in and around Tasmania often seemed coloured
with sadness. Is it the harsh terrain, the relative isolation
or perhaps the climate that makes every book to come from
the apple isle read like a dramatic tragedy? Whatever
the reasons, Danielle Wood's first novel, and winner of
the Vogel Literary Award, The Alphabet of Light and
Dark follows this trend. It is a story about loneliness
and solitude, of isolation and separation, of one person's
desperate search for her elusive past and another's futile
attempts to leave his own past behind.
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The
novel is mostly set on Bruny Island, a frigid, inhospitable
place which 'follows Tasmania like a comma, a space for
pause'. Essie has come back to the island after the death
of Charlie, her grandfather, to write her family history.
Essie's great-great grandfather had been Superintendent
of the Cape Bruny Lighthouse and the story, as well as
her family history, is inextricably linked to the building.
Wood's own great-great grandfather was Superintendent
of the same lighthouse, giving The Alphabet of Light
and Dark a slight biographical air, with a sense of
being grounded in real history.
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Pete,
the story's other main character, is employed cleaning
the lighthouse while on hiatus from his work culling feral
cats on Macquarie Island, perhaps the most isolated rock
on earth. Part-time sculptor, Pete is an aboriginal man,
a part of a people long thought to be extinct in Tasmania.
So whereas all Essie has to remember her history by is
a postcard of her great aunt Alva, a carved coconut from
Batavia and a coin found inside an oyster, Pete's history
was supposed to have died out over one hundred years ago.
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Having
met as children, in essence Essie and Pete are lost soulmates.
Connected by their lack of place, Essie is convinced that
living in Australia she will never have a place, 'her
own native land' and Pete is surrounded by constant reminders
that according to cultural legend, he shouldn't actually
exist. They are both alone and lonely. Both their fathers
are absent; Pete would rather not see his mother and Essie's
died when she was a child. Their similarities make them
a match on paper, but any romance between the two cannot
get off the ground when their pasts get in the way.
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The
actual storyline of The Alphabet of Light and Dark
is hard to pin down. It seems that everything happening
in the present is completely connected with the events
of the past. As Essie writes her family history, the story
of her ancestors becomes her own story, with them reliving
her own hardships and tragedies. In fact, as Essie writes
her history, it seems as though very little happens at
all to her and Pete, as compared with the seemingly endless
procession of deaths, disappearances, sicknesses and failed
relationships that colours their past.
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Wood
appears to have chosen a benign chapter in the lives of
her two main characters, a time when they can sit back
and reflect, letting the past come flooding back to them.
This setting of the novel, while interesting, is also
very challenging for the reader. Wood makes it very hard
to imagine a chronology for the lives of either Essie
or Pete, constantly swapping between dates and places.
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Wood's
voice is very strong and consistent with beautifully realised
imagery. Her complex characters come to life with intense
but often subtle description. Much of the novel is written
in the passive voice and has a very slow pace, forcing
readers to immerse themselves in the story. The main failing
here is that the voice of the omniscient and often disconnected
narrator and that of Essie, in her writing, are almost
identical and this proves a bit jarring. Wood's ability
to tell a good tale is great, however, and her re-telling
of a Gaelic mer-child myth is one of the most powerful
narratives in the novel.
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Wood
clearly has an intimate knowledge of Bruny Island and
her description of various landmarks conjures vivid images
of the isolated place, constantly ravaged by the sea,
the wind and the intense cold. At times, and especially
early on in the novel, Wood does take her description
to the point of saturation, with sentences made almost
unreadable by an endless stream of adjectives.
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As
a first novel, The Alphabet of Light and Dark is
a deserving winner of the Vogel. It would be enjoyed most
by a lover of historical fictions and best read on a cold
night with a box of tissues at the ready. Wood most definitely
continues on in the grand tradition of Tasmanian literary
melancholy and does it very well. |
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