David Malouf’s novels have won him many prestigious literary prizes and a devoted readership worldwide since his first novel Johnno was published in 1975. His most recent, Ransom, published in 2009, won prizes too, and was particularly well received in the American press. It is a poignant recreation from Homer’s Iliad of King Priam’s attempt to obtain decent burial for his son Hector after the vengeful Achilles has dragged his body daily for ten days (because after each day’s sacrilege the gods have made it new) around the funeral pyre of his lover, Patroclus, whom Hector has slain in battle. The delicacy, firmness, pathos and lyricism of its writing can be savoured over and over again. One of Malouf’s early novels, Fly Away Peter (1982) still lives with me, and Ransom, published 27 years later, reminded me of it.
The Aboriginal Justice Support Group of Action for World Development, which meets locally in Newtown, has been lobbying for justice for Australia’s Indigenous peoples for over 30 years. It recently nominated two inspiring Aboriginal women’s organisations for an award conferred by the Australian Human Rights Commission.
REDFERN: A groundbreaking resource, both for the future of Aboriginal people before the law and for the development of social policy, was launched on Tuesday July 10 at the Aboriginal Legal Service (ALS) in Elizabeth Street.
