''To the Islands'' is a 1958 novel by
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...
n author
Randolph Stow
Julian Randolph Stow (28 November 1935 – 29 May 2010) was an Australian-born writer, novelist and poet.
Early life
Born in Geraldton, Western Australia, Randolph Stow was the son of Mary Campbell Stow née Sewell and Cedric Ernest Stow, a ...
. It won the
Miles Franklin Award
The Miles Franklin Literary Award is an annual literary prize awarded to "a novel which is of the highest literary merit and presents Australian life in any of its phases". The award was set up according to the will of Miles Franklin (1879–195 ...
for 1958 and the
ALS Gold Medal
The Australian Literature Society Gold Medal (ALS Gold Medal) is awarded annually by the Association for the Study of Australian Literature for "an outstanding literary work in the preceding calendar year." From 1928 to 1974 it was awarded by the ...
in 1959.
Plot summary
The novel is set in a remote
Anglican mission in the
Kimberley
Kimberly or Kimberley may refer to:
Places and historical events
Australia
* Kimberley (Western Australia)
** Roman Catholic Diocese of Kimberley
* Kimberley Warm Springs, Tasmania
* Kimberley, Tasmania a small town
* County of Kimberley, a ...
in the far north of
Western Australia
Western Australia (commonly abbreviated as WA) is a state of Australia occupying the western percent of the land area of Australia excluding external territories. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to th ...
.
The protagonist is Heriot - based partially on the figure of
Ernest Gribble
Ernest Richard Bulmer Gribble (23 November 186818 October 1957) was an Australian missionary. Though considered to be temperamentally unsuited to his vocation, he became a strong advocate for better treatment of Australian Aboriginal people, savin ...
- the principal chaplain of the mission, who commits an act of violence against an Aboriginal man, and who subsequently disappears into the wilderness.
Publication history
Originally published in England in 1958, and the USA in 1959, the novel was the first novel published by
Penguin Australia
Penguin Books is a British publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers The Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the following year.[Angus and Robertson
Angus & Robertson (A&R) is a major Australian bookseller, publisher and printer. As book publishers, A&R has contributed substantially to the promotion and development of Australian literature.Alison, Jennifer (2001). "Publishers and editors: A ...]
. Audio book editions appeared in the 2000s.
Text Publishing
Text Publishing is an independent Australian publisher of fiction and non-fiction, based in Melbourne, Victoria (Australia), Victoria.
Company background
Text Media was founded in Melbourne in 1990 by Diana Gribble and Eric Beecher, along wit ...
, in its republishing Australian novels, produced their edition in 2015.
Reviews
On the novel's re-issue in 2014, Suzie Gibson in ''The Conversation'' stated that "Although Stow’s novel presents us with challenging social, political and historical issues, it was never denied literary merit. Indeed the power of Stow’s prose is the equal of anyone’s from
Patrick White
Patrick Victor Martindale White (28 May 1912 – 30 September 1990) was a British-born Australian writer who published 12 novels, three short-story collections, and eight plays, from 1935 to 1987.
White's fiction employs humour, florid prose, ...
to
Christina Stead
Christina Stead (17 July 190231 March 1983) was an Australian novelist and short-story writer acclaimed for her satirical wit and penetrating psychological characterisations. Christina Stead was a committed Marxist, although she was never a mem ...
; it is exquisite in its sparseness, precision and surprising beauty. The frankness and difficulty of the subject matter is counter-balanced by the splendour of Stow’s memorable turns of phrase."
"The Case for Randolph Stow", ''The Conversation'', 24 June 2014
/ref>
Awards and nominations
* 1958 - winner Miles Franklin Award
The Miles Franklin Literary Award is an annual literary prize awarded to "a novel which is of the highest literary merit and presents Australian life in any of its phases". The award was set up according to the will of Miles Franklin (1879–195 ...
* 1959 - winner ALS Gold Medal
The Australian Literature Society Gold Medal (ALS Gold Medal) is awarded annually by the Association for the Study of Australian Literature for "an outstanding literary work in the preceding calendar year." From 1928 to 1974 it was awarded by the ...
References
External links
Middlemiss.org
Tom Shapcott review
from ''Australian Book Review
''Australian Book Review'' is an Australian arts and literary review. Created in 1961, ''ABR'' is an independent non-profit organisation that publishes articles, reviews, commentaries, essays, and new writing. The aims of the magazine are 'to ...
''
Review
from Australian Public Intellectual Network
1958 Australian novels
Miles Franklin Award-winning works
Novels set in Western Australia
ALS Gold Medal winning works
Randolph Stow
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