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textpublishing's review against another edition
5.0
‘Quietly astonishing: enthralls, entertains and gratifies on every level.’
Helen Garner
‘The happiness a consummate novelist bestows upon a reader—the feeling that under no circumstance can you bear not to know what happens next, nor can you bear to come to the end of the tale—this is Jessica Anderson’s great narrative gift. The Commandant was published in England in 1975 when its English publisher put a bodice-ripper jacket on it. Today it can be published in a different way, in a different country, and be seen for the masterpiece it is.’
Carmen Callil
Helen Garner
‘The happiness a consummate novelist bestows upon a reader—the feeling that under no circumstance can you bear not to know what happens next, nor can you bear to come to the end of the tale—this is Jessica Anderson’s great narrative gift. The Commandant was published in England in 1975 when its English publisher put a bodice-ripper jacket on it. Today it can be published in a different way, in a different country, and be seen for the masterpiece it is.’
Carmen Callil
leannep's review against another edition
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
4.0
1830s Australia. A penal settlement in Queensland, Moreton Bay. The commandant is cruel. 25, 50, 100, 200 lashes are standard. His wife's younger sister arrives and struggles with the brutality. Times are changing. I enjoyed the women's perspective. So lucky not to live in them times, man or woman!
sarah1984's review against another edition
3.0
22/1 - This was an interesting read that led me to reading the Wikipedia page about Moreton Bay penal colony and the death of Patrick Logan. There were lots of themes that I didn't recognise while I was reading, but have now been informed of by reading others' reviews. If you want a cohesive review of the actual book I would recommend Brona's Books's' review as their review is where I learned about all the themes I missed. I was far more interested in the truth behind the story than I was in the subtext behind the dialogue.
Prior to picking it up at the library I had never heard of the author or any of the historically accurate events or people. I didn't even know there was a penal colony at Moreton Bay and learning about it is what led me to investigating all the penal colonies that ever existed in Australia. Between 1787 and 1869 there were a total of 15 colonies opened and then closed. The longest-running was Norfolk Island which was open from 1788 till 1855. Reading the book and the Wikipedia pages gave me a craving to listen to Great Southern Land by Icehouse (the most serious Australian song there is, the least serious Australian song being Down Under by Men at Work).
Prior to picking it up at the library I had never heard of the author or any of the historically accurate events or people. I didn't even know there was a penal colony at Moreton Bay and learning about it is what led me to investigating all the penal colonies that ever existed in Australia. Between 1787 and 1869 there were a total of 15 colonies opened and then closed. The longest-running was Norfolk Island which was open from 1788 till 1855. Reading the book and the Wikipedia pages gave me a craving to listen to Great Southern Land by Icehouse (the most serious Australian song there is, the least serious Australian song being Down Under by Men at Work).
kirstenfindlay's review
emotional
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
captainfez's review against another edition
5.0
Jessica Anderson is someone who I've always meant to read more of but hadn't managed to. Tirra Lirra By The River was loosely covered in my Eng Lit degree, and didn't make much of an impression (probably because of my youthful inattention, frankly) but The Commandant, it turns out, is exceptional.
It's one of the titles reissued in Text Publishing's yellow-covered series of classics, and from the introduction I can see how the work might have been considered a bodice-ripper when it came out. Though - the off-screen appearance of shagging, if any, aside - it's a disservice to call it such. It's a meditation on early Australian history, as well as a forerunner of other such historical fiction as Peter Carey's Oscar and Lucinda. It sits well with Patrick White's Voss inasmuch as it takes history for its basis, and then adds to it, using invention as the magnifying glass for fact.
The titular character is a real person: Patrick Logan, commandant of the Moreton Bay penal colony. The book, more or less, is a portrait of the man - his hardness, his fierceness, his apparent strangeness - through the lens of the women of his life. Scratch that: it's not just him that's under the microscope: it's the entire way of life the Crown has transplanted to the arse end of the world, and how unsuited to existence here the settlers and convicts are.
Logan's wife, Lettie O'Beirne, is given a fictional sister, Frances, who is as unformed and prone to enthusiasm as the colony itself. She comes to Moreton Bay to join her sister, following an intersection with some Jacobite followers, adding a bit of political grounding to her arrival. Her grasp of etiquette is mirrored in the ramshackle, almost horseless way the penal colony is run; there's convicts with behaviours above their station, drunken doctors, and the tension that comes from trying to do too much without enough raw material.
At its heart, the book examines whether the colonists and their charges should be there at all. There's a heavy trepidation to any journeys outside the camp, and an oppression within. The bush is unknowable and full of dangers, and everywhere, there's intimations of death. It's a pungent, noisome thing, this life, and Anderson communicates well the dreamlike daze one must have felt to wash up on these shores, so different and distant from 'home'.
The important part of this novel, I think - and something that's also key to The Proposition, the Nick Cave-penned film that has a dark view of flogging-led colonial governance - is that everyone in it is flawed in some way. There's the servant whose truculence is undercut with scars on her neck; the wife who sees the problems in her husband and tries to ignore them; officers who try to warn Logan of the effects of his actions but lose nerve at the last minute, and the doctor who has escaped indiscretion through distance and drink. Everyone is broken, and their inability to function as expected cannot help but inform their surrounds.
It could be argued the same applies to Australia today.
I wholeheartedly enjoyed this. While the broad strokes of Logan's death are known ahead of reading, there's a lot in here for you to discover, particularly if you're interested in the distinctly unheroic story - a little chamfered, for narrative effect - of early Australian life.
(One final note: I found it almost impossible to read The Commandant without hearing The Drones' '16 Straws' in my head. It's a song that adapts the convict song 'Moreton Bay' and adds in a bit more Logan spice, including elements that occur in the text. It's worth a listen.)
It's one of the titles reissued in Text Publishing's yellow-covered series of classics, and from the introduction I can see how the work might have been considered a bodice-ripper when it came out. Though - the off-screen appearance of shagging, if any, aside - it's a disservice to call it such. It's a meditation on early Australian history, as well as a forerunner of other such historical fiction as Peter Carey's Oscar and Lucinda. It sits well with Patrick White's Voss inasmuch as it takes history for its basis, and then adds to it, using invention as the magnifying glass for fact.
The titular character is a real person: Patrick Logan, commandant of the Moreton Bay penal colony. The book, more or less, is a portrait of the man - his hardness, his fierceness, his apparent strangeness - through the lens of the women of his life. Scratch that: it's not just him that's under the microscope: it's the entire way of life the Crown has transplanted to the arse end of the world, and how unsuited to existence here the settlers and convicts are.
Logan's wife, Lettie O'Beirne, is given a fictional sister, Frances, who is as unformed and prone to enthusiasm as the colony itself. She comes to Moreton Bay to join her sister, following an intersection with some Jacobite followers, adding a bit of political grounding to her arrival. Her grasp of etiquette is mirrored in the ramshackle, almost horseless way the penal colony is run; there's convicts with behaviours above their station, drunken doctors, and the tension that comes from trying to do too much without enough raw material.
At its heart, the book examines whether the colonists and their charges should be there at all. There's a heavy trepidation to any journeys outside the camp, and an oppression within. The bush is unknowable and full of dangers, and everywhere, there's intimations of death. It's a pungent, noisome thing, this life, and Anderson communicates well the dreamlike daze one must have felt to wash up on these shores, so different and distant from 'home'.
The important part of this novel, I think - and something that's also key to The Proposition, the Nick Cave-penned film that has a dark view of flogging-led colonial governance - is that everyone in it is flawed in some way. There's the servant whose truculence is undercut with scars on her neck; the wife who sees the problems in her husband and tries to ignore them; officers who try to warn Logan of the effects of his actions but lose nerve at the last minute, and the doctor who has escaped indiscretion through distance and drink. Everyone is broken, and their inability to function as expected cannot help but inform their surrounds.
It could be argued the same applies to Australia today.
I wholeheartedly enjoyed this. While the broad strokes of Logan's death are known ahead of reading, there's a lot in here for you to discover, particularly if you're interested in the distinctly unheroic story - a little chamfered, for narrative effect - of early Australian life.
(One final note: I found it almost impossible to read The Commandant without hearing The Drones' '16 Straws' in my head. It's a song that adapts the convict song 'Moreton Bay' and adds in a bit more Logan spice, including elements that occur in the text. It's worth a listen.)
brona's review against another edition
4.0
4 and half stars
The Commandant is based on Captain Patrick Logan, the man in charge of the Moreton Bay convict settlement on the present day site of Brisbane.
Moreton Bay Settlement 1835
He was a cruel task master, feared by all the convicts.
But the story is told mostly from the point of view of his young (fictional) sister-in-law, Frances, recently arrived from Ireland.
In some ways, this story could be seen as a simple drawing room story about two sisters, but of course, the outside world intrudes regularly on their domestic dramas. There is a strong message about the role of women in the early years of colonisation and how they coped with the isolation, the lack of modern amenities and the constant fear of the unknown. Frances is told by one of the other women,
'Whatever course you take,' she said, half-shutting her eyes, 'no doubt in ten years or so you will arrive at the state of the most of us - simply of making do with what one has. Surprisingly enough -' she opened surprised eyes - 'it is an art in which one may progress. I thought I knew all about making do with what one had, but now I find I can do more with it than I dreamed.'
Anderson's deceptively straightforward plot also hides many viewpoints and tensions.
We see the doubt and confusion that the soldiers and their wives feel about Logan's actions. The young doctors, who have to tend the battered backs of the recently whipped convicts, have another story to tell. The threat of a highly publicised court case in Sydney to deal with the rumours of Logan's cruelty bubble away underneath the surface, only to rear up every time a ship arrives with mail. The menace of the convicts, who far outnumber the soldiers, is felt throughout the story. How the convicts view the settlers and how they, in turn, view the convicts is a tension that Anderson plays with deftly.
Underlying all this, though, is another viewpoint. The local Aboriginal population are spoken of and seen fleetingly by our main characters. They know they are being watched, rumours and myths are rampant. Yet the reader can also see this little settlement, barely clinging onto the land around the Brisbane River, through the eyes of the Aboriginals, wondering who on earth where these strange people with their stone walls and inappropriate clothing and guns.
Full review here - http://bronasbooks.blogspot.com.au/2017/11/the-commandant-by-jessica-anderson.html
The Commandant is based on Captain Patrick Logan, the man in charge of the Moreton Bay convict settlement on the present day site of Brisbane.
Moreton Bay Settlement 1835
He was a cruel task master, feared by all the convicts.
But the story is told mostly from the point of view of his young (fictional) sister-in-law, Frances, recently arrived from Ireland.
In some ways, this story could be seen as a simple drawing room story about two sisters, but of course, the outside world intrudes regularly on their domestic dramas. There is a strong message about the role of women in the early years of colonisation and how they coped with the isolation, the lack of modern amenities and the constant fear of the unknown. Frances is told by one of the other women,
'Whatever course you take,' she said, half-shutting her eyes, 'no doubt in ten years or so you will arrive at the state of the most of us - simply of making do with what one has. Surprisingly enough -' she opened surprised eyes - 'it is an art in which one may progress. I thought I knew all about making do with what one had, but now I find I can do more with it than I dreamed.'
Anderson's deceptively straightforward plot also hides many viewpoints and tensions.
We see the doubt and confusion that the soldiers and their wives feel about Logan's actions. The young doctors, who have to tend the battered backs of the recently whipped convicts, have another story to tell. The threat of a highly publicised court case in Sydney to deal with the rumours of Logan's cruelty bubble away underneath the surface, only to rear up every time a ship arrives with mail. The menace of the convicts, who far outnumber the soldiers, is felt throughout the story. How the convicts view the settlers and how they, in turn, view the convicts is a tension that Anderson plays with deftly.
Underlying all this, though, is another viewpoint. The local Aboriginal population are spoken of and seen fleetingly by our main characters. They know they are being watched, rumours and myths are rampant. Yet the reader can also see this little settlement, barely clinging onto the land around the Brisbane River, through the eyes of the Aboriginals, wondering who on earth where these strange people with their stone walls and inappropriate clothing and guns.
Full review here - http://bronasbooks.blogspot.com.au/2017/11/the-commandant-by-jessica-anderson.html
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