 |
|
|
|
|
| |
Nirvana's
Children by Concon Ranulfo.
University of Queensland Press, 2001. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
Napoleon
Taal is an angry adolescent. He is angry with his dad,
angry with his teachers and angry at the entire adult
world. He even gets angry with his girlfriend Christine
and having persuaded her to go to bed with him, turns
around and pisses her off. How much anger can one lad
have?
|
|
1 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
An
acrimonious dispute with his father sees Napoleon leave
home, carrying his beloved cricket bat and heading for
the bright lights of Kings Cross. He encounters a surreal
street gang headed by Blondie, an underage Jesus figure
with an impulse to martyrdom. Following the demise of
Blondie Napoleon falls in love with Sammi, an employee
in the sexual services industry with a substance abuse
problem. Not unexpectedly, Sammi experiences a fatal overdose
causing Napoleon to return to the family home sadder,
but little wiser.
|
|
2 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
I
found it difficult to enjoy this novel as the narrator
displays more than the usual amount of adolescent self-pitying
inwardness. Napoleon appears curiously unaffected by the
tragedies he encounters in Kings Cross. Experience, understanding,
growth and a dawning maturity all manage to elude this
contemporary Peter Pan and his damned cricket bat.
|
|
3 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
It
must be said that while I found the aggressive tone of
this novel a bit hard to bear, other critics have warmed
to Ranulfo's highly individualistic stream-of-consciousness
style. The well-respected Pam Macintyre, in a review in
the Australian (13 June 2001), described Ranulfo's
novel as "wonderful witty, clever and idiosyncratic".
I think there will be little middle ground when readers
consider Nirvana's Children.
|
|
4 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
An
earlier version of this review was published in Imago:
New Writing. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
