Harry Heathcote of Gangoil A Tale of Australian BushLife Anthony Trollope 9781519285508 Books
Download As PDF : Harry Heathcote of Gangoil A Tale of Australian BushLife Anthony Trollope 9781519285508 Books
Trollope's only Australian novel, Harry Heathcote of Gangoil deals with the problems facing a young sheepfarmer, or 'squatter' (modelled after Trollope's son Frederic) in outback Australia. Using conventions of the Christmas story established by Dickens in the late 1840s, the novel shows Harry Heathcote thwarting the envious ex-convict neighbors who harbor his disgruntled former employees and who attempt to set fire to his pastures. Trollope draws heavily on his knowledge of the social and economic conditions of bush life acquired during a year-long visit to Australia in 1871-2.
Harry Heathcote of Gangoil A Tale of Australian BushLife Anthony Trollope 9781519285508 Books
Having spent a year reading the entirety of Trollope's most famous works, the Barsetshire and Palliser novels, I found it hard to jump into a new novel from the same author. I took about a month and a half "off" before trying to get back into my plan to read his entire library of 46 novels.Somehow I stumbled upon this one at a used bookstore, and was alarmed at its brevity. The World's Classic edition comes in at a mere 125 pages, shorter than even The Warden. So, I figured this would make a good re-introduction to the author. Indeed, I polished it off easily in two days, and found it much more light than what I was used to.
This is, in fact, Trollope's shortest novel (I believe today it would be called a "novella"). As such, there is only one main story, and because of the brevity it moves along very quickly. Trollope notoriously embellished many of his novels to stretch them out over many installments for magazine publication (see also today's primetime drama TV programming). As such, it can often be hard to keep track of his stories in such lengthy works. But here we see him capably telling a concise story.
Billed as a "Christmas story," it really only tangentially includes the holiday as a time setting. The action is set entirely in the Australian "bush lands," where Harry Heathcote, a sheep rancher, lives in fear of his surrounding enemies attempting to destroy his property with fire. Early on, he antagonizes his neighbor who has hired a man that he himself recently fired. Convinced this man is actively seeking his destruction, Harry spends every possible moment riding his enormous acreage hoping to catch his enemy in the act. The best portions of the story follow his inner monologue as he slowly comes to the realization that his entire time spent in Australia has been one of making multiple enemies, and how he has come to a point where there are few people he can trust.
The action builds to a climax with a much more intense and exciting altercation than Trollope has been known for. From here the story rapidly wraps up with what has to be one of his more tacked-on romance conclusions. I suppose novels of the day simply could not exist without some form of romance, for this one has absolutely no bearing on the story as a whole.
Concise and entertaining, it's one of the easiest Trollope's I've read. It certainly isn't a banner example of his style and talent, but it's very enjoyable as is, and I recommend it, especially to those who are fans of the author, if only to see him in a different setting and atmosphere.
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Harry Heathcote of Gangoil A Tale of Australian BushLife Anthony Trollope 9781519285508 Books Reviews
I liked this better than my rating indicates but only because I was born in Australia and have "rellies" there, and that made the story more interesting to me than it would have otherwise been. The other reviewer made me realize some important points that were made in the story, but when I read it, I saw only my personal interest in Australia being gratified, for the plot was too simple to be satisfying, and the characters less interesting than those of most Trollope books. But the picture of "the bush" in Australia at that time of history was really well rendered, and for that reason I don't regret the time spent reading this book. If you've never read Trollope, however, don't start here (unless you, too, have a strong interest in Australia).
Trollope wrote this very short novel (only about 45,000 words) for the Christmas issue of a London magazine. Regarding Victorian sentimentality about the holiday as "humbug", he presented a very different sort of Yuletide tale, one in which there are no snow flakes and no sleigh bells - and in which fires are not cozy but frightening.
The hero is a prosperous young sheep rancher in Queensland, where December is the hottest, driest month of the year, when a careless match can spark a ruinous blaze and in a few hours wipe out all that a man has built through years of labor.
Careless matches are not the only danger. Harry has just as much fear of malicious ones. He is an imperious ruler of his domain (120,000 acres leased from the Crown) and prides himself on his unflinching candor. Not surprisingly, he is at feud with his shiftless, thieving neighbors, the Brownbie clan, and is quite willing to quarrel with Giles Medlicot, another neighbor, when Medlicot hires on a hand whom Harry has dismissed for insubordination and suspects of plotting arson.
In other Trollope novels, "war to the knife" means snubbing an enemy in the street or not inviting him to a garden party. In this one, conflict is simpler and more violent. With the grass growing more parched by the hour, Harry's enemies gather, scheme and strike. Because Trollope is not a tragedian, they are thwarted - narrowly - and there is even a Christmas dinner to conclude the story and incidentally seal a budding romance. But the pacing and atmosphere are very different from the Trollope that readers expect.
The picture of a frontier society, living almost in a Hobbesian "state of nature", is vivid, and the moral consequences of that state are clearly drawn. Harry's refusal to compromise with what he believes to be wrong is a principle that can be safely followed only where the structures of law and order offer shelter. Where a man must be his own constable, high principle is a dangerous luxury. The appearance of two colonial policemen at the end, as helpless to punish the malefactors as they were to forestall them, underlines the impotence of the law and perhaps reminded Trollope's audience of the excellence of their own social arrangements.
Alert members of that audience will perhaps have noticed that Queensland displays ironic inversions of English certitudes. Most notably, Harry leases his land and _therefore_ considers himself socially much above Medlicot, who has purchased his. In the home country, of course, a land owner who farmed his property (Medlicot is a sugar grower) would have looked severely down upon a man who kept livestock on rented pastures.
Unfortunately, despite its excellent qualities, "Harry Heathcote" suffers a defect that reduces it to the Trollopian second class (albeit that is no low place to be). In so short a work, nothing should be wasted, and too many words are wasted here on a perfunctory romance, one of the least interesting that Trollope ever devised. Medlicot's courtship of Harry's sister-in-law not only adds nothing to the narrative but is positively detrimental, as it gives the neighbor a self-interested motive for his decision to take Harry's side against the Brownbie conspiracy rather than maintain a "fair-minded" neutrality.
Anyone who has never read Trollope should not begin here, but the author's fans will not regret passing a few hours with him in the Australian bush.
Having spent a year reading the entirety of Trollope's most famous works, the Barsetshire and Palliser novels, I found it hard to jump into a new novel from the same author. I took about a month and a half "off" before trying to get back into my plan to read his entire library of 46 novels.
Somehow I stumbled upon this one at a used bookstore, and was alarmed at its brevity. The World's Classic edition comes in at a mere 125 pages, shorter than even The Warden. So, I figured this would make a good re-introduction to the author. Indeed, I polished it off easily in two days, and found it much more light than what I was used to.
This is, in fact, Trollope's shortest novel (I believe today it would be called a "novella"). As such, there is only one main story, and because of the brevity it moves along very quickly. Trollope notoriously embellished many of his novels to stretch them out over many installments for magazine publication (see also today's primetime drama TV programming). As such, it can often be hard to keep track of his stories in such lengthy works. But here we see him capably telling a concise story.
Billed as a "Christmas story," it really only tangentially includes the holiday as a time setting. The action is set entirely in the Australian "bush lands," where Harry Heathcote, a sheep rancher, lives in fear of his surrounding enemies attempting to destroy his property with fire. Early on, he antagonizes his neighbor who has hired a man that he himself recently fired. Convinced this man is actively seeking his destruction, Harry spends every possible moment riding his enormous acreage hoping to catch his enemy in the act. The best portions of the story follow his inner monologue as he slowly comes to the realization that his entire time spent in Australia has been one of making multiple enemies, and how he has come to a point where there are few people he can trust.
The action builds to a climax with a much more intense and exciting altercation than Trollope has been known for. From here the story rapidly wraps up with what has to be one of his more tacked-on romance conclusions. I suppose novels of the day simply could not exist without some form of romance, for this one has absolutely no bearing on the story as a whole.
Concise and entertaining, it's one of the easiest Trollope's I've read. It certainly isn't a banner example of his style and talent, but it's very enjoyable as is, and I recommend it, especially to those who are fans of the author, if only to see him in a different setting and atmosphere.
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