Murray Bail
Author of Eucalyptus
About the Author
Murray Bail has won numerous prizes for his novels -- Eucalyptus, Homesickness, and Holden's Performance -- including the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Eucalyptus. He lives in Sydney
Works by Murray Bail
Associated Works
Lost Classics: Writers on Books Loved and Lost, Overlooked, Under-read, Unavailable, Stolen, Extinct, or Otherwise Out of Commission (2000) — Contributor — 320 copies, 6 reviews
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Birthdate
- 1941-09-22
- Gender
- male
- Occupations
- novelist
short story writer - Nationality
- Australia
- Birthplace
- Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
- Places of residence
- Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
Sydney, New South Wales, Australia - Associated Place (for map)
- Australia
Members
Reviews
A victim of false marketing: many goodreads reviewers complain that there's no plot here. They are correct. But since Bail isn't interested in a standard plot, that's not his fault. Nor is it the readers' fault. Anyway.
The introduction in this 'Text Classics' edition describes Bail as a cross between Patrick White and Don Delillo, which is pretty much accurate, except that he's far funnier than Delillo. His strength is set pieces, and he plays to it here: a group travels the world; we see show more them in hotels and in museums, and that's about it.
I found this wonderful to begin with--the first museum, in an unnamed African country, is essentially dedicated to the detritus of colonialism, and our naive Australian travelers aren't very comfortable with this. Later, in England, we get a museum of corrugated iron. Possibly only Australians will actually understand the humor and pathos here, but trust me, corrugated iron is next to Vegemite in the Australian national identity. So after failing to understand the deep history of colonialism, the travelers get to confront the far gentler version of the Australian colony. In South American they see the museum of the leg, specifically designed to tire and bore attendees, so they become aware of their own legs.
And at this point it becomes clear that Bail is also up to metanarrative tricks: this 'boring' museum comes along just at the point when his readers will be bored with the constantly recurring museum set scenes. Homesickness, from this perspective, demands more of its readers than you might expect. You have to fight through the boredom of the unexpected, and the rewards are great.
After the leg museum the relationships between the characters take on a new strength, which reinforces the book's more intellectualized points. In the U.S. we see a museum of marriage, the strongest section of the book. It brings together the more or less dysfunctional relationships between the characters, or in their history, and the way that 'romance' is used in fiction to the detriment of more interesting or relevant material. Just in case you didn't get it, the chapter ends with our travelers being led to a treehouse, from which they are invited to observe black men raping a white woman--and, quite possibly, encouraged to shoot the men.
Towards the end the book veers into Kafka territory, which isn't particularly interesting, but does point to the ambition and seriousness of the book; an ambition which Bail matches, in a very Australian way, with slapstick (one of the travelers is a blind photographer; he often falls over).
If you've read any of Michel Houllebecq's books about tourism and been even remotely intrigued, Bail's is far better, and brings far more to the table than the Frenchman. If you like Delillo's set scenes, Bail gives you a different take on them. If you like Patrick White's prose, Bail gives it to you with much more good humor. Highly recommended. show less
The introduction in this 'Text Classics' edition describes Bail as a cross between Patrick White and Don Delillo, which is pretty much accurate, except that he's far funnier than Delillo. His strength is set pieces, and he plays to it here: a group travels the world; we see show more them in hotels and in museums, and that's about it.
I found this wonderful to begin with--the first museum, in an unnamed African country, is essentially dedicated to the detritus of colonialism, and our naive Australian travelers aren't very comfortable with this. Later, in England, we get a museum of corrugated iron. Possibly only Australians will actually understand the humor and pathos here, but trust me, corrugated iron is next to Vegemite in the Australian national identity. So after failing to understand the deep history of colonialism, the travelers get to confront the far gentler version of the Australian colony. In South American they see the museum of the leg, specifically designed to tire and bore attendees, so they become aware of their own legs.
And at this point it becomes clear that Bail is also up to metanarrative tricks: this 'boring' museum comes along just at the point when his readers will be bored with the constantly recurring museum set scenes. Homesickness, from this perspective, demands more of its readers than you might expect. You have to fight through the boredom of the unexpected, and the rewards are great.
After the leg museum the relationships between the characters take on a new strength, which reinforces the book's more intellectualized points. In the U.S. we see a museum of marriage, the strongest section of the book. It brings together the more or less dysfunctional relationships between the characters, or in their history, and the way that 'romance' is used in fiction to the detriment of more interesting or relevant material. Just in case you didn't get it, the chapter ends with our travelers being led to a treehouse, from which they are invited to observe black men raping a white woman--and, quite possibly, encouraged to shoot the men.
Towards the end the book veers into Kafka territory, which isn't particularly interesting, but does point to the ambition and seriousness of the book; an ambition which Bail matches, in a very Australian way, with slapstick (one of the travelers is a blind photographer; he often falls over).
If you've read any of Michel Houllebecq's books about tourism and been even remotely intrigued, Bail's is far better, and brings far more to the table than the Frenchman. If you like Delillo's set scenes, Bail gives you a different take on them. If you like Patrick White's prose, Bail gives it to you with much more good humor. Highly recommended. show less
I liked this okay as I was reading it, and I like it a lot more for reading all the negative reviews. Bail does the now standard modernist version of is-this-now-or-is-this-a-memory-and-what's-the-difference-really, and does it fairly well. For the record, "now" is on a boat from Vienna to Australia. The memories are of Vienna. It's pretty easy to get once that's clear.
The story is similarly simple: a man goes to Vienna, music capitol of the Western world, to sell his newly invented piano. show more He pretty much fails to sell it, but does succeed in picking up the daughter of a Viennese socialite and music aficionado.
The book becomes worthwhile once it's read as the sum of its influences, to wit, Thomas Bernhard (and other cranky Austrians writing about how shit Austria is) Henry James (New World naif is taken in by/clashes with old world sophisticates) Virginia Woolf (see above re: now standard modernist form). Bail seems to be wrestling with his own debts to the European modernist and whatever you call Bernhard's time period writers, which can easily be read as a case study in the broader question of Australia's relationship to its European heritage. The answer, in good Jamesian style, is ambivalence.
Bail uses many obviously Bernhardian tics (long paragraphs, complex syntax, Vienna, music, slightly cracked protagonist), but at the same time asserts himself. Our heroic piano inventor goes to Europe, sells one piano to an avant-garde composer who 'writes' a piece that requires the destruction of said piano, then comes back to Australia, where he finds himself inevitably changed, but not changed into a Viennese. Just changed.
I have no idea how anyone would read this who hasn't read, at the very least, Bernhard's "Loser" and James's "The American." It might make no sense at all. For fans of those books, though, this is a nice addition to the corpus. show less
The story is similarly simple: a man goes to Vienna, music capitol of the Western world, to sell his newly invented piano. show more He pretty much fails to sell it, but does succeed in picking up the daughter of a Viennese socialite and music aficionado.
The book becomes worthwhile once it's read as the sum of its influences, to wit, Thomas Bernhard (and other cranky Austrians writing about how shit Austria is) Henry James (New World naif is taken in by/clashes with old world sophisticates) Virginia Woolf (see above re: now standard modernist form). Bail seems to be wrestling with his own debts to the European modernist and whatever you call Bernhard's time period writers, which can easily be read as a case study in the broader question of Australia's relationship to its European heritage. The answer, in good Jamesian style, is ambivalence.
Bail uses many obviously Bernhardian tics (long paragraphs, complex syntax, Vienna, music, slightly cracked protagonist), but at the same time asserts himself. Our heroic piano inventor goes to Europe, sells one piano to an avant-garde composer who 'writes' a piece that requires the destruction of said piano, then comes back to Australia, where he finds himself inevitably changed, but not changed into a Viennese. Just changed.
I have no idea how anyone would read this who hasn't read, at the very least, Bernhard's "Loser" and James's "The American." It might make no sense at all. For fans of those books, though, this is a nice addition to the corpus. show less
Let me start with an excerpt.
Would that more often, we were left in an intimate, unresolved state. Eucalyptus is truly kaleidoscopic, yet soothing and intimate rather than harsh and disorienting. Here is playful writing at its best, still full beauty and life. Murray Bail's writing carries us lightly through both the scientific world of eucalypts and the emotional world of longing and fulfillment. "The scientific naming of trees doesn't follow a pattern," he tells us. "In some respects it has an attractive, amateur randomness just like the distribution of the trees themselves." Which somehow makes it a perfect source of inspiration for the telling of stories, stories meant to win the affection of our dear daughter, Ellen.
And so another story fragment unfolds.
There is a merging, an interplay, of order and disorder throughout the novel. And isn't that how we feel about ourselves? The parts we understand and the parts we don't? The parts we want to control and the parts we want to discover? Sometimes we try to remain motionless in ourseves, take our own aerial view, find our own hidden pattern. But we know, too, that we just sort of happens, and we can't be completely explained.
As you can tell, I loved this book, and can't wait to read a few more of Bail's other novels.
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Here he could look at her closely. He began wandering among the many different birthmarks and beauty spots. As for Ellen, her questions seemed to direct him towards her state of dress. For a moment, without looking down, Ellen wasn't sure whether she was being buttoned or unbottoned.show more
Came his voice, 'When the breeder of canaries knocked on Miss Kirschner's door he had dandruff on his shoulders. She had a squint in one eye---something like that. And she had the
excruciating taste in furnishings usually found with musicians. It's a mystery how an attraction can spring up in one person for another. Who can say why? It would be amazing, except it happens all the time. A person's voice, say a man's voice, heard in the dark or behind a door is sometimes enough. But it must be a combination of things. What do you think?'
'Just voice isn't enough, I don't believe.'
'There must be cases where the attraction is not deliberate. It just sort of happens,' he proposed. 'it can't be explained---a real mystery. There's no logic to it,' he added. It was enough for him to shake his head.
'Logic?' She almost wanted to laugh.
'I mean the person is not given a choice in the matter.'
In and out went the conversation, and the light and shade slanted between the trees. Normally he would have gone long a ago. Clearly he wanted to stay. Frowning again, he was looking away from her.
'And you don't know whether your stories are true or not?' She waited, not thinking of anything else.
So it was left in that intimate, unresolved state, which too can be seen as something of a mystery.
Would that more often, we were left in an intimate, unresolved state. Eucalyptus is truly kaleidoscopic, yet soothing and intimate rather than harsh and disorienting. Here is playful writing at its best, still full beauty and life. Murray Bail's writing carries us lightly through both the scientific world of eucalypts and the emotional world of longing and fulfillment. "The scientific naming of trees doesn't follow a pattern," he tells us. "In some respects it has an attractive, amateur randomness just like the distribution of the trees themselves." Which somehow makes it a perfect source of inspiration for the telling of stories, stories meant to win the affection of our dear daughter, Ellen.
Remaining motionless Ellen tried to decipher a shape to the stories; she even followed the contours of the plantation, somehow taking an aerial view of the stories, as if that would reveal a hidden pattern....
These were women who followed the idea of hope. It seemed to be their greatest obedience. Ellen couldn't help respecting them. These women, one by one, moved about with a form of lightness, and obeyed their ideas of truth to feelings. Ellen usually liked the women he happened to talk about. Under the Spinning Gum he had his hands in his pockets as he turned to face her. 'Off the coast of Victoria,' he shielded his eyes, 'was a wife of a lighthouse keeper who became addicted to kite-flying. She was young and had no children...'
And so another story fragment unfolds.
There is a merging, an interplay, of order and disorder throughout the novel. And isn't that how we feel about ourselves? The parts we understand and the parts we don't? The parts we want to control and the parts we want to discover? Sometimes we try to remain motionless in ourseves, take our own aerial view, find our own hidden pattern. But we know, too, that we just sort of happens, and we can't be completely explained.
As you can tell, I loved this book, and can't wait to read a few more of Bail's other novels.
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A widowed father moves to a large ranch in Australia where he plants hundreds of eucalyptus trees on his land (there are 700 distinct species, I had no idea!) He’s pretty much obsessed with the trees. His daughter grows up into a beautiful young woman, admired by many in town but kept secluded on the ranch. The father announces that he will give his daughter in marriage to the man who can correctly name every tree on his property. Many come with little success- they’re really just there show more hoping to catch a glimpse of the daughter. Then a man arrives who is a eucalyptus specialist himself; he methodically walks the land with the father, naming tree after tree, in no hurry but looks easily able to finish the task. The daughter watches with growing apprehension- she’d thought nobody would ever be able to name all the trees. She falls into silence and despondency. Meanwhile, another man appears on the property, just sitting under a tree. He starts to show up every day, finding the daughter where she’s walking under the eucalypts, and he casually tells her stories. Odd little stories that don’t really have endings. They catch her interest and she seeks out his company day after day, while all the while becoming more dismayed that the other man will win her hand.
This whole novel feels like a parable. It has a dreamy air of magical realism, though really there are no magical elements, maybe a few slightly surreal things happen in the stories that are told. In some parts the style definitely reminded me of Gabriel Garcia Márquez. I thought at first I wouldn’t like this book- it feels like the characters are all held at arm’s length, you never really sink into anything as a reader. The storyline flits back and forth through the multitude of smaller stories- rather like the incomplete shade cast by a eucalyptus, I suppose. I was going to ditch it after the first few chapters but kept going and became more intrigued to see how it ends. It’s one I think worth a re-read someday. There is plenty of information on the eucalyptus trees themselves in the pages, the characteristics of their leaves, what type of soil the different species like, the strength of their timber and its uses, etc. Readers not much interested in plants might find this tedious, but I kind of liked it.
from the show less
This whole novel feels like a parable. It has a dreamy air of magical realism, though really there are no magical elements, maybe a few slightly surreal things happen in the stories that are told. In some parts the style definitely reminded me of Gabriel Garcia Márquez. I thought at first I wouldn’t like this book- it feels like the characters are all held at arm’s length, you never really sink into anything as a reader. The storyline flits back and forth through the multitude of smaller stories- rather like the incomplete shade cast by a eucalyptus, I suppose. I was going to ditch it after the first few chapters but kept going and became more intrigued to see how it ends. It’s one I think worth a re-read someday. There is plenty of information on the eucalyptus trees themselves in the pages, the characteristics of their leaves, what type of soil the different species like, the strength of their timber and its uses, etc. Readers not much interested in plants might find this tedious, but I kind of liked it.
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