Ethel Turner (1872–1958)

The single greatest work of book-length fiction in 19th century Australia (rivalled only by the short stories of Henry Lawson and Steele Rudd) is a children's book. Ethel Turner's masterpiece haunts me, and I think it always will. Turner saw something in the still nascent Australia and its people, at just the period when the country was breaking free from its imperial roots (but before anyone other than white Anglos were permitted to live there) that I believe helped perpetuate that sense of show more freedom and difference from Europe. Read passionately by children for a century, I'm not sure if this work will reach the generation now starting school, but I hope so.

Turner says that not one of the seven children "is really good, for the very excellent reason that Australian children never are... [I]n Australia a model child is - I say it not without thankfulness - an unknown quantity.
It may be that the miasmas of naughtiness develop best in the sunny brilliancy of our atmosphere. It may be that the land and the people are so young-hearted together, and the children's spirits are not crushed and saddened by the shadow of long years' sorrowful history.
There is a lurking sparkle of joyousness and rebellion and mischief in nature here, and therefore in children.”

This is a work by a privileged white woman, no doubt, in a country that committed some grave sins in the 19th century. But as a work for Australian children, none of that should matter. Thank you, Ethel. show less

The children in the Woolcot family are as spunky and disaster-prone and as individual as the Bastables, but after 19 chapters comes the most unexpected and horrifying tragedy. There are struggles and misunderstandings and suffering amidst the joy and gentle humour earlier in the book, but nothing to prepare us for this -- that's how life is, isn't it. I think I cried as much over this book as I did over Little Women (and I'm much older than when I read LW). An outstanding book, and just as show more fresh as if it had been written in the 1990s instead of the 1890s, but I won't want to re-read it until I have had time to recover from the first reading. If ever.

Update 12 years later: the horror of the ending has faded somewhat, but not enough to make me ready to read it again. If there was ever a PTSD inducing children's book, this would be it.

13.5 years later: I'm not going to live long enough to get over the trauma. And I think I hate the abusive father. show less

"The family at Misrule" is set five years after the events of "Seven little Australians", there is a new sibliing (named Esther after her young mother) and the older children are grappling with maturity. Captain Woolcot and Esther are sent to India, and the book tells of how the children fare under the care of oldest child Meg, now twenty one. In many ways it's similar to the earlier book, but it is still extremely moving. It's also interesting to see how society has changed in the show more intervening 125 years, and how facing separation, illness and death was a part of children's lives in a way it has not been for us until the recent pandemic. Probably best only read if you've read the previous book (and with a box of tissues handy at the end). show less

I read this over twenty years ago as a teenager. Didn't think much of it then, so I think it's time I had another look to see if I can change my mind.

2015 Update Well apparently my reading tastes have changed little in the nearly thirty years since I was a teenager, although I now have a clearer idea why I don't enjoy certain books. In this case, my dislike of this book doesn't stem from the quality of writing, but rather the characterisations and plot. As a teen reader I think I found the show more children's constant "naughtiness" tiresome. Looking at it now, I can see that their "naughtiness" is more unfettered childishness and lack of proper parenting. I've reached the end of the third chapter and the fourth excessive punishment, two of them being thrashings. I can't take any more. I know parenting has changed in the last hundred years, but I just can't read a book with such incompetent parenting, even if it is a classic. I can't be sure if I finished this book as a teen. I think I did, so the teenage me did considerably better than the adult me. show less