![]() ![]() ![]() The deeply insecure white community occupies ‘Uptown’ with its neat, clean houses and its unquestioning sense of entitlement. It is a place with a stratified population. The combination of storytelling on a mythic scale with the guile of the knowing look generates the energy required to drive this genius epic.Ĭarpentaria is set in the small town of Desperance. Whether it is the charismatic voice of her omniscient narrator or the everyday dialogue spoken by her characters, Wright recognises the strength of the oral tradition as a satirical and ironic tool. So if you want to know what Will Phantom looked like – he looked like that.’ Midnight’s reverent delivery has lacerating wit he plays his listener for the outsider he is, yet he does it with a tone of sincerity. This lad was writing memory with a firestick that made lightning look dull. He got on a tie, clean white shirt and a nice suit.’ His response is several pages long, a vivid, vernacular stream of detail about the essence of Will: his relationship with his father and his country, his difference to other men and women, his ability to control his own fate. He eyes the questioner and astutely spots him as a ‘Southern blackfella … a real smart one, educated, acting as a guide. There is a mesmerising scene in Carpentaria when Joseph Midnight is asked if he has seen the fugitive Will Phantom, a young local Aboriginal man who is single-handedly waging a guerrilla war against a large lead ore mining company. ![]()
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