Kangaroo (novel)

"Kangaroo" is a novel by D. H. Lawrence, first published in 1923. It is set in Australia.

Description

"Kangaroo" is an account of a visit to New South Wales by an English writer named Richard Lovat Somers, and his German wife Harriet, in the early 1920s. This appears to be semi-autobiographical, based on a three-month visit to Australia by Lawrence and his wife Frieda, in 1922.

The novel includes a chapter ("Nightmare") describing the Somers' experiences in wartime Cornwall (St Columb Major), vivid descriptions of the Australian landscape, and Richard Somers' sceptical reflections on fringe politics in Sydney.

Australian journalist Robert Darroch — in several articles in the late 1970s, and a 1981 book entitled " D.H. Lawrence in Australia" — claimed that Lawrence based "Kangaroo" on real people and events he witnessed in Australia. The extent to which this is true remains a matter of controversy.

"Kangaroo" is the nickname of one of Lawrence's characters, Benjamin Cooley, a prominent ex-soldier and lawyer, who is also the leader of a secretive, fascist paramilitary organisation, the "Diggers Club". Cooley fascinates Somers, but he maintains his distance from the movement itself. It has been suggested by Darroch and others that Cooley was based on Major General Charles Rosenthal, a notable World War I leader and right wing activist. [cite web | url = http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A110459b.htm | title = "Rosenthal, Sir Charles (1875 - 1954)" | accessdate = 2007-06-20 | author = A. J. Hill | authorlink = | coauthors = | year = 1988 [print version] | format = | work = Australian Dictionary of Biography (ADB) | publisher = Australian National University (ANU) | pages = | language = | archiveurl = | archivedate = | quote = ] It has also been alleged that Rosenthal was involved with the Old Guard, a secret anti-communist militia, set up by the Bruce government. [ cite web | url = http://www.cybersydney.com.au/dhl/thesis1.htm | title = "The Darroch Thesis", "DHL in Australia research, 1972-2002, Part 1: September 1972-March 1990" | accessdate = 2007-07-08 | author = See, for example, the research notes of Sandra Darroch & Robert Darroch | authorlink = | coauthors = | date = | year = 2000-01 | month = | format = | work = | publisher = DH Lawrence Society of Australia | pages = | language = | quote = ] [cite web | url = http://www.schools.nsw.edu.au/nswconstitution/html/dismissal/bgr/impact.html | title = "What if Jack Lang had not been dismissed?" | accessdate = 2007-07-03 | author = Andrew Moore | authorlink =| coauthors = | date = | year = 2001 | month = | format = | work = NSW Constitution website | publisher = NSW Department of Education and Training | pages = | language = | quote = ]

Similarly, according to Darroch, the character of Jack Calcott — who is the Somers' neighbour in Sydney and introduces Richard Somers to Cooley — may have been based on a controversial Australian military figure, Major John Scott, [Sandra Darroch & Robert Darroch, 2000-01, "DHL in Australia research, 1972-2002, Part 1: September 1972-March 1990", "Ibid".] who was both an associate of Rosenthal, and an Old Guard official. [ cite web | url = http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A110566b.htm | title = "Scott, William John Rendell (1888 - 1956)" | accessdate = 2007-07-08 | author = Andrew Moore | authorlink = | coauthors = | year = 2006 | format = | work = ADB | publisher = ANU | pages = | language = | archiveurl = | archivedate = | quote = ] [Hill, "Rosenthal, Sir Charles (1875 - 1954)", "Ibid".]

Another central character is Willie Struthers, a left wing activist reputed to have been based partly on Willem Siebenhaar, who made Lawrence's acquaintance in Western Australia. [cite web | url = http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/AS10435b.htm | title = "Siebenhaar, Willem (1863 - 1936)" | accessdate = 2007-06-20 | author = Naomi Segal & Edward Duyker | authorlink = | coauthors = | year = 2006 | format = | work = ADB | publisher = ANU | pages = | language = | archiveurl = | archivedate = | quote = ]

Kangaroo's movement, and the "great general emotion" of Kangaroo himself, do not appeal to Somers, and in this the novel begins to reflect Lawrence's own experiences during World War I. [cite book |last=W. H. Wilde |first= |authorlink= |coauthors= Joy Hooton and Barry Andrews |editor= |others= |title= "The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature"|origdate= |origyear=1985|edition=2nd |series= |year= 1994|publisher= Oxford University Press|location= Melbourne|language= |isbn=0 19 553381 X |oclc= |doi= |id= |pages=p. 459 |chapter= |chapterurl= |quote= ] Somers also rejects the socialism of Struthers, which emphasises "generalised love".

The novel is sometimes cited as an influence on the Jindyworobak movement, an Australian nationalist literary group, which emerged about a decade later. [W. H. Wilde, Joy Hooton and Barry Andrews, 1994, "The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature", "Ibid."] Gideon Haigh saw fit to dub it "one of the sharpest fictional visions of the country and its people". [Haigh 2008.]

It was adapted as a film, also called "Kangaroo" in 1986, featuring Colin Friels as Somers, Judy Davis as Harriet and Hugh Keays-Byrne as "Kangaroo".

Footnotes

References

*D. H. Lawrence, "Kangaroo" (1994; originally published 1923), edited by Bruce Steele, New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-38455-9
*Robert Darroch, " D.H. Lawrence in Australia" (1981), South Melbourne: Macmillan Co. of Australia. ISBN 0-333-33760-3
*Haigh, Gideon. "Big pictures, artfully painted". 6 September 2008. http://content-rsa.cricinfo.com/magazine/content/current/story/361075.html (accessed September 7, 2008).