Very well written, sad but brilliant!! ( )

I am very late to the party with this one. It won Seizure's Viva la Novella Prize in 2017, and was nominated for the Stella Prize the following year. It's been reviewed by all the bloggers in our network, including Jennifer, Kate, Kim, Sue and Marg, to whom I owe thanks because it was her review in 2021 that made me realise I didn't have a copy of it. I almost always buy the winners of this prize, but I somehow I overlooked this one...

What can I possibly add?

Readers of Jean Rhys' Wide Sargasso Sea will recognise the idea of bringing to life a minor character from another novel. Rhys invented a compassionate back story for the 'madwoman in the attic' in Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre. Riwoe brings the reader the story of the misrepresented 'Malay trollop' in W. Somerset Maugham's story, ‘The Four Dutchmen’.

It's not one of Maugham's better stories. It's only five pages long, and three pages of it is devoted to establishing the deep and abiding bond between the four Dutchmen who formed the crew of a trading vessel. This friendship is severed by the Captain's 'susceptibility' to the charms of the native girls. His dreams of retirement with one of these girls is quoted at the beginning of Riwoe's story:

One of these days he would buy himself a house on the hills in Java and marry a pretty little Javanese. They were so small and so gentle and they made no noise, and he would dress her in silk sarongs and give her gold chains to wear round her neck and gold bangles to put on her arms. ('The Four Dutchmen (1928) , in 'The World Over, The Collected Stories Vol II, by W. Somerset Maugham, The Reprint Society London, 1954, p. 1082-3)

Maugham was writing in the days of Empire, portraying the last days of colonialism in India, Southeast Asia, China and the Pacific, so it's interesting to look at how he portrays 'the Orient'. Unlike Kipling and Conrad, Maugham does not represent it as dark, primitive and threatening. The threats in his 'The Four Dutchmen' comes from these seemingly genial and contented Europeans.

To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2021/10/23/the-fish-girl-by-mirandi-riwoe-2017-co-winne... ( )

I devoured this novella in one short sitting. What an incredibly sensory experience. There are so many powerhouse female writers in Australia. ( )