Harland’s Half Acre (Masterplots II: British and Commonwealth Fiction Series)
At a glance:
- Author: David Malouf
- First Published: 1984
- Type of Work: Impressionistic realism
- Time of Work: From early in the twentieth century to the mid-1980’s
- Setting: Southern Queensland, Australia
- Principal Characters: Frank Harland, Phil Vernon, Walter (Knack) Nestorius, Aunt Roo
- Genres: Long fiction, Impressionistic literature
- Subjects: Culture, History, Family or family life, Suffering, Suicide, Twentieth century, Art or artists, Visions, epiphanies, or revelations, Land settlement, Australia or Australians
- Locales: Australia, South Queensland, Australia
The Novel
Against a broad sweep of Australian twentieth century history, Frank Harland, an artist, lives a life that is emblematic of that country’s evolving social identity, even though he remains an outsider, set apart by his calling.
Harland lives on the fringes of society but seeks an artistic identity rooted in society—more specifically, in his sense of family. A family-tied, worldly undertaking symbolizes that spiritual pursuit: From the early decades of the century until his death in the 1980’s, Harland quietly buys up the farmland that had been worked by...
[The entire page is 1932 words long]
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