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The White Girl

di Tony Birch

UtentiRecensioniPopolaritàMedia votiCitazioni
1257216,987 (4)6
"'A profound allegory of good and evil, and a deep exploration of human interaction, black and white, alternately beautiful and tender, cruel and unsettling.'-Guardian Australia's leading indigenous storyteller makes his American debut with this immersive and deeply resonant novel, set in the 1960s, that explores the lengths we'll go to save the people we love-an unforgettable story of one native Australian family and the racist government that threatens to separate them. Odette Brown has lived her entire life on the fringes of Deane, a small Australian country town. Dark secrets simmer beneath the surface of Deane-secrets that could explain why Odette's daughter, Lila, left her one-year-old daughter, Sissy, and never came back, or why Sissy has white skin when her family is Aboriginal. For thirteen years, Odette has quietly raised her granddaughter without drawing notice from welfare authorities who remove fair-skinned Aboriginal children from their families. But the arrival of a new policeman with cruel eyes and a rigid by-the-book attitude throws the Brown women's lives off-kilter. It will take all of Odette's courage and cunning to save Sissy from the authorities, and maybe even lead her to find her daughter. Bolstered by love, smarts, and the strength of their ancestors, Odette and Sissy are an indomitable force, handling threats to their family and their own identities with grace and ingenuity, while never losing hope for themselves and their future. In The White Girl, Miles Franklin Award-nominated author Tony Birch illuminates Australia's devastating post-colonial past-notably the government's racist policy of separating Indigenous children from their families, known today as the Stolen Generations-and introduces a tight-knit group of charming, inspiring characters who remind us of our shared humanity, and that kindness, hope, and love have no limits"--… (altro)
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Set in the 1960s, "The White Girl" is the story of Odette who is raising her granddaughter, Sissy, after her mother ran away. Although this novel showcased the cruel treatment of Aboriginal people it was also a story full of heart and tenderness. Odette would do anything to protect her granddaughter and the only times I was concerned about Sissy's safety was when she was not in her grandmother's presence.

Parts of this novel were heartbreaking but others were uplifting, especially when people willingly assisted Odette and Sissy. Also, the bond between grandmother and granddaughter and the land was truly touching.

From the start, the writing was engaging and the author did a wonderful job bringing the township of Deane alive. All the characters were strong and compelling, but Odette was definitely my favourite. I adored her. A worthwhile read. ( )
  HeatherLINC | Dec 22, 2023 |
This is a sweet, well-characterised piece of fiction, and I think perhaps an important read at this point in time. In the early 1960s, Odette, an old lady in a small country town, cares for her illegitimate granddaughter Sissy. Odette has lived long enough to watch the transition of Australia from colonial outpost to modern nation, but along the way she has never been considered worthy of owning a piece of the pie for one simple reason: she is Aboriginal. Sissy, too, of course is Aboriginal but her father is white and she has been blessed - the characters would say - to have very light skin. As a result, her place in the culture is both more assured (there is some opportunity to "pass" as white) but also more dangerous - Sissy is still, like all Aboriginal people, a ward of state, and thus it is very easy for certain people to assume they have ownership rights over her. When the town's crop of unpleasant white men begin showing an interest in Sissy, Odette is forced to reckon with the truth about what happened to Sissy's mother, and to find a route for the two of them to get the heck out of Dodge.

Birch is a straightforward writer of general fiction, and The White Girl is an easy read. Birch draws clear dividing lines between his good and evil characters, which would frustrate in a more literary work, but here feel instead like reflections of the cultural forces pulling at Sissy from both sides. To achieve this, Birch uses the literary toolkit of a Charles Dickens, drawing his supporting characters in broad strokes to better bring out the essential goodness of his protagonist (in contrast to the Emile Zola school of writing, where every character must be at least a little bit angelic and a wee bit cruel).

As Odette gradually narrates her past to Sissy, I was reminded how rarely older women get to play a leading role in fiction, and how rarely the grandmother/granddaughter relationship is permitted to be a positive force. The novel is also suffused with that strange melancholy of "historical fiction" set within what is - for some - still living memory. (For me, I had to occasionally check my assumptions that this was taking place in the distant past. No; only three decades after the events of this story, I myself would be growing up in a country town of my own. Admittedly, mine was more like the regional hub from which residents of Deane visit for their shopping and to gawk at the latest inventions of modernity.)

Nevertheless, I am surprised to see The White Girl among the finalists for this year's Miles Franklin Award. When I think of that award's goal to target the "highest literary merit", I think of many of Birch's fellow nominees - Peggy Frew's elegant prose, John Hughes' sparse determination, Philip Salom's inventiveness, and the sheer sublimity of Tara June Winch. I think instead we would be wise to celebrate Birch for his own strengths, and his ease of readership, rather than elevating popular fiction just so that awards panels can widen their audience base.

Still, none of this is Birch's fault. I would recommend The White Girl to all those interested in Australian history, but with a caveat that this is a Dickensian view of the world, not a Zolaesque one. ( )
  therebelprince | Oct 24, 2023 |
This book was really good! Odette Brown has lived her whole life on the fringes of a small country town. Raising her granddaughter, Sissy, by herself, she has managed to stay under the radar of the 'welfare' authorities who are removing Aboriginal children from their communities. When the menacing Sergeant Lowe comes to town he is determined to fully enforce the law & Odette fears for her & Sissy's freedom......
Tony Birch manages to capture the Aussie outback perfectly with his writing. This is another plodder but is no means boring, it's anything but! I shared Odette's frustration at all the restrictions & the humiliation of the 'exemption' certificate. The lengths that Aborigines had to go to back then to keep their families safe was terrible. Anyway, read this for yourselves, it's really good. ( )
1 vota leah152 | Feb 10, 2021 |
Perhaps I shouldn’t question the opinion of one of Australia’s most prominent literary critics, but it seems to me that Geordie Williamson labelling the characterisation of this novel as "easy binaries" in his review* misses the point…
The White Girl is a story about people who’ve grown up in a binary world, among the powerless, the poor, the uneducated and the dispossessed. They have learned from their history and their own experiences not to trust people in positions of power – policemen, The Welfare, teachers, missionaries and bureaucrats. The story is set in the Menzies era, but today, they could add Centrelink to that list. And this attitude that the powerless inherit when they are young and sometimes carry with them into adulthood can translate into assumptions about the people they meet: good or evil; kindly or cruel; trustworthy or not; helpful or exploitative. Those who are fortunate need to understand that while it isn’t always a fair assumption to make, this short-hand binary view of the world can be a form of self-protection for an underclass. Depicting it in literature is a legitimate thing to do.
And in presenting this world the way Indigenous people too often experience it, Tony Birch isn’t lapsing into easy binaries: he’s a highly skilled, award-winning author who knows exactly what he’s doing: quite apart from using historically valid sources for his content, (which I’ve certainly come across in Indigenous memoir) Birch is not only offering a window into what can be an Indigenous view of the world, he’s also using recognisable character types just like Charles Dickens did when exposing social problems to an indifferent society. (But Birch is a good deal more economical than Dickens, the book is only 272 pages long, and written in piercingly deft contemporary prose).
On the verge of (illegally) leaving town Odette takes her granddaughter Sissy to visit the cemetery:
After visiting with her parents Odette walked Sissy past the other graves, explaining the connection she had to family and Odette’s childhood friends.
‘You need to know all of these people,’ she said, ‘and you must remember them.’
Sissy looked around at the headstones. ‘There’s a lot of people here, Nan. How will I remember all of them?’
‘Through the stories,’ Odette said. ‘I’m telling them to you, and it will be your job to remember. It’s just like the story in the book you’re reading. The story of the dog from Africa. You told me about that today, and already I can remember it. Our stories are not written in any books, which means you’ll need to keep telling them to your own family one day.’ (p.131)

Yes.
And how to do that for a wider audience, is an author’s choice.
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2019/07/08/the-white-girl-by-tony-birch/ ( )
1 vota anzlitlovers | Jun 23, 2019 |
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"'A profound allegory of good and evil, and a deep exploration of human interaction, black and white, alternately beautiful and tender, cruel and unsettling.'-Guardian Australia's leading indigenous storyteller makes his American debut with this immersive and deeply resonant novel, set in the 1960s, that explores the lengths we'll go to save the people we love-an unforgettable story of one native Australian family and the racist government that threatens to separate them. Odette Brown has lived her entire life on the fringes of Deane, a small Australian country town. Dark secrets simmer beneath the surface of Deane-secrets that could explain why Odette's daughter, Lila, left her one-year-old daughter, Sissy, and never came back, or why Sissy has white skin when her family is Aboriginal. For thirteen years, Odette has quietly raised her granddaughter without drawing notice from welfare authorities who remove fair-skinned Aboriginal children from their families. But the arrival of a new policeman with cruel eyes and a rigid by-the-book attitude throws the Brown women's lives off-kilter. It will take all of Odette's courage and cunning to save Sissy from the authorities, and maybe even lead her to find her daughter. Bolstered by love, smarts, and the strength of their ancestors, Odette and Sissy are an indomitable force, handling threats to their family and their own identities with grace and ingenuity, while never losing hope for themselves and their future. In The White Girl, Miles Franklin Award-nominated author Tony Birch illuminates Australia's devastating post-colonial past-notably the government's racist policy of separating Indigenous children from their families, known today as the Stolen Generations-and introduces a tight-knit group of charming, inspiring characters who remind us of our shared humanity, and that kindness, hope, and love have no limits"--

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