Summary Nineties
KS Prichard The
Nineties The
novel “Nineties” is the first part of the famous trilogy, which also includes the novels Golden Miles (1948) and Winged Seeds (1950). The trilogy covers sixty years of Australian history, dating back to the nineties of the last century. It has the same heroes; their fate and relations the writer traces with unflagging attention.
Nineties – the time of the gold rush in Australia, when crowds of people from all over the world rushed to the north-west of the country in the hope of getting rich. Did they succeed in this? In her novel, the writer directly and unambiguously answers this question.
Gold! The life of the human community depends on it. Everyone dreams of fabulous wealth. When the rumor of a new find reaches a settlement of prospectors, then everyone starts to move. People are rushing to march for gold. Heavily loaded camels, wagons, gigs, carts harnessed by old nags, baityuggs, donkeys, people on bicycles,
Before us is the life of several families, poor and modest, typical representatives of working-class Australia. This is the family of Sally and Morris Gaug, in which, of course, the main role is played by Sally. Common sense, steadfastness, courage, spiritual purity are the main features of her character, helping to survive in the conditions of that hard struggle for existence, to which her life condemns. Still quite a girl, she marries Morris Gauge, an unlucky offspring of an English aristocratic family, who is sent to Australia for correction, providing a small amount of money. The farmer did not work out of it – he does not get along with the workers, does not know how to run the farm, then puts the money in the mine, but loses them with the work. Having become a prospector during the gold rush, Morris wants to return to England as a millionaire and restore the wealth of the family.
In the village of Southern Cross, then in Kalgoorli Sally opens a dining room, and then a guesthouse for prospectors. It is assisted by working miners, among whom the principle of comradeship is inviolable. Therefore, they strongly condemn Morris, who in one of his unsuccessful campaigns for gold left Sally sick of the natives. Those who saved her life. However, prospectors still believe that people are smeared with tar and dumped in feathers for lesser sins than this attitude toward their wife. Sally also does not allow anyone to scold Morris and remains true to him, despite all the proposals Frisco de Morfe, an old companion of Morris, constantly rich and buying up during periods of stagnation for a pittance digging sites and mines. Asking, borrowing or stealing for Frisco is one and the same. Frisco buys Maritan, a simple-hearted aboriginal girl, her father and her future husband for a few bottles of wine and two packets of tobacco. But she does not want to recognize her as her child. Maritana and her mother Kalgurla are the heroines who represent the theme of the aborigines in the novel, which is very close to the writer. There are scoundrels, she notes, who kidnap the tuzemok, rape them, while other whites have to pay for someone else’s guilt – aborigines take revenge on any white man. So there is a theme of enmity between whites and Aborigines. It was already stated on the front pages of the novel, which tells how Kalgurlu, who had just given birth to a girl, two white men forced to take them to where the water is. and other whites have to pay for someone else’s guilt – Aborigines take revenge on any white man. So there is a theme of enmity between whites and Aborigines. It was already stated on the front pages of the novel, which tells how Kalgurlu, who had just given birth to a girl, two white men forced to take them to where the water is. and other whites have to pay for someone else’s guilt – Aborigines take revenge on any white man. So there is a theme of enmity between whites and Aborigines. It was already stated on the front pages of the novel, which tells how Kalgurlu, who had just given birth to a girl, two white men forced to take them to where the water is.
Frisco and Paddy Kevan fit in-a shabby boy who does not disdain the resale of stolen gold. At the end of the novel, he is already the owner of a profitable mine. Such people will become the largest gold miners of the country in the future.
The tragic line of the novel is connected with the family of Laura and Olf Brierly. Laura is a beautiful and poorly adapted woman to the hardships of austere life, which is more likely to be an adornment of society. At first, this family seems to smile at happiness – Olf profitable sells its gold mine, acquires its own house and even breaks into the managers of the mine, because he always had a craving for knowledge and he persevered in self-education. The vision of a calm, prosperous life loomed before him like a mirage. Old age and poverty frighten him. And Olf decides to become a reliable man for the owners: he does not allow himself to take part in the struggle of prospectors for his ancestral rights. Initially, this struggle is purely economic in nature: prospectors defend their right to search for placer gold anywhere no closer than fifty feet from the gold-bearing vein. Sites with veined gold, requiring high costs and machinery, should be allocated for development to industrial companies. The rights of prospectors for alluvial gold are the foundation of the welfare of the state, as ore mined by industrial companies flows into Perth, the state’s main city, or overseas, enriching foreign shareholders.
Transatlantic owners of gold mining enterprises are not so much interested in gold mining as in the exchange game. They cash in on the issue of shares of lime gold plots almost more than on the shares of the richest mines. The mining of gold becomes a means of fraud, robbing gullible people, and the mines themselves, the author writes, like “dark horses,” the true dignity of which the owner of the race stables keeps secret,
The long and difficult struggle of miners gradually assumes a political character when in crowded assemblies and demonstrations the demands of self-government, the allocation of mines to an independent state, including it in the federation of the Australian states are put forward. In the history of Australia, these sentiments and speeches of the broad masses in the last decade of the last century had their effect, and in 1901 six Australian states, before being an English colony, received the rights of the dominion.
Olf Brayrley takes the side of entrepreneurs on the issue of the rights of prospectors for placer gold. He no longer meets with old friends and is bitterly convinced that they turned away from him. Even his crony friend Dinny Queen, with whom he once went in search of gold. In these days, Olf is helped only by Morris Gaug, who protects Olf before the prospectors. True, Paddy Kevan also shows sympathy for Olf. But Paddy, as always, pursues his interest. Alf tidies up papers related to reporting at the Paddy mine, but does not want to participate in his thieves’ machinations with gold. Therefore, he soon loses the last work in his life. Find another, without a diploma, Olf, being just a practitioner in his case, can not. From America and Germany specialists come to Australia with a diploma. They are appreciated. Olf understands, that he made a mistake by not supporting the prospectors in their struggle for their rights, and comes frankly to talk about this with Dinny Cain. Soon Olf commits suicide. In a farewell letter to his wife, he begs to forgive him – he has no other option to provide ee and daughter, and the money that she will receive under the insurance policy, they will be enough for the first time. Old comrades decide to bury Olf at his own expense and raise some money for his loved ones.
The third family, which is given many pages in the novel, is Jean and Marie Robillard. The Frenchman Jean Robillard came to Australia healthy and young, from England, where he was a teacher. He dreams of saving money and buying a piece of land and cattle. But the farmhand’s earnings are not enough, and he joins the first group of prospectors, who rushes for gold to the Southern Cross. With him goes and Marie.
Gold did not find Jean and worked for a while at the mine. Then he entered the hotel as a cook. Soon, the Robyars move to Kalgoorlie, and Olf promises to arrange Jean for his mine. But he already began to cough. Together with their father, they are building a hut for Brownie near the mine Brown Hill. Jean continues to work underground, but his cough is stifled: after all, miners work with a kyle and a drill in the light of a lantern in the faces where the dust is. People are suffocating in the smoke from blasting. Thousands of miners die from consumption, and poor fastenings lead to accidents during frequent collapses. But people are cheaper than a fastening forest. Everyone understands that the days of Jean are numbered.
In the last episode of the novel, we see Sally, Morris and Dinney on the veranda of their common house. In this conversation, as it were, sums up all the life’s ups and downs during the gold rush – the old era of gold exploration in these mines has ended, Morris notes. A new one begins: now industry will be enlarged and everything will be subordinated to its interests. But scams and speculation should stop, Dinny believes, you need to fight for your rights, if people do not want to be robbed. They won the battle for placer gold because they showed their strength and solidarity. A new stage of the struggle is coming. On this optimistic note, the first part of the trilogy ends.
(1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)