In a small Aboriginal town dominated by a haze cloud, which heralds both ecological disaster and a gathering of the ancestors, Cause Man Steel is chasing a mad vision: a national donkey transport scheme that will guarantee his people's independence forever. He finds, however, as he bundles feral donkeys into his Ford Falcon and dumps them en masse in the cemetery, that not all of Praiseworthy agrees. Outrage ferments at his desecration of traditional land, while Cause's wife Dance seeks refuge with butterflies and dreams of ...
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In a small Aboriginal town dominated by a haze cloud, which heralds both ecological disaster and a gathering of the ancestors, Cause Man Steel is chasing a mad vision: a national donkey transport scheme that will guarantee his people's independence forever. He finds, however, as he bundles feral donkeys into his Ford Falcon and dumps them en masse in the cemetery, that not all of Praiseworthy agrees. Outrage ferments at his desecration of traditional land, while Cause's wife Dance seeks refuge with butterflies and dreams of moving their family to China. Bad feelings reach fever pitch when citizens catch wind of the suicide of Aboriginal Sovereignty, Cause's eldest son. All are distraught - all, that is, except eight-year-old Tommyhawk Steel, who, with his brother gone, gleefully pursues his dream of becoming white and powerful. Told with the richness of language and scale of imagery for which Alexis Wright has become renowned, Praiseworthy is a marvel of explosive sentences, a shock to allegory, an outraged cry against oppression, and a biting satire for the end of days.y for which Alexis Wright has become renowned.
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Seller's Description:
New in New jacket. Giramondo Press, Artarmon (Australia), 2023. First edition. First printing (with full number line including 1). This is the first Australian edition, the hardcover edition. (A trade paperback was published simultaneously. ) Very Fine in a very fine jacket. A pristine unread copy. Comes with archival-quality mylar jacket protector. Smoke-free. Jacket is unpriced, as issued (not a book club edition, but the limited hardcover edition, released in a small press-run). This novel won the 2023 Queensland Literary Award for Fiction. An epic novel, 736 pages. After its initial publication in Australia by Giramondo Publishing in 2023, the novel came out in February 2024 in USA by New Directions. Shortlisted for the Dublin Literary Award, one of six books chosen by an international panel of judges from the longlist of 70 books. Wright is a member of the Waanyi nation. The novel was shortlisted for the James Tait Black Prize for Fiction. The novel also won the Stella Prize, which was described by the judges as a canon-crushing Australian novel for the ages. Praiseworthy is not only a great Australian novel perhaps the great Australian novel it is also a great Waanyi novel. And it is written in the wild hope that, one day, all Australian readers might understand just what that means. In winning the Stella for Praiseworthy, Wright has become the first author to win the award twice, having previously received it in 2018 for Tracker, her collective memoir of Aboriginal leader Tracker Tilmouth.