The Lieutenant by Kate Grenville
+3

The Lieutenant by Kate Grenville

SKU TBM9781847673473
AU$22.00
Buy 2+ Australian fiction & save 40% on the lowest priced book. Offer applied at checkout.
In stock
1
Product Details

Book Description

Secondhand. Good condition. Wear to book corners. Pages are sunned.

The Lieutenant was inspired by a real story hidden for two centuries in the pages of a couple of shabby blue notebooks stored in a London manuscript library. The notebooks belonged to William Dawes, a soldier in the first days of the Colony of New South Wales, and they record his efforts to learn the language of the indigenous people of Sydney. Between the lines they reveal an extraordinary friendship – warm, playful and respectful – between him and one of his teachers, a young indigenous girl called Patyegarang.
Reading the conversations in the notebooks – what she said, what he said – you long to know who these two remarkable people were, who could reach out across gulfs of difference and form a friendship that still blazes off the page two centuries later. Those conversations were the starting-point for the novel. I didn’t change any of the words in those conversations, but tried to draw a picture of the circumstances in which they might have happened.
This is a novel, but it stays close to the historical events. They bring up issues that are still with us. How do we value difference, and learn to communicate across it? How do we learn how to listen as well as speak, and how do we respond when life presents us with a moral choice that leaves no room for evasion? (Kate Grenville)
Save this product for later
  • Search Products
  • Track Orders
  • Favorites
  • Shopping Bag
  • Gift Cards
  • Sign In
Display prices in: AUD
Menu
Close
Book Merchant Bookstore
Home
Store
Rewards
About
Nuts & Bolts
Happy Readers
Contact
0417 900 145miriam.mortimore@thebookmerchant.com.au
© 2021 The Book Merchant 14 Clare Row College Grove Bunbury Western Australia 6230
Terms & Conditions Privacy Policy Shipping & Payment Info Return Policy About Us
Cookie settings
Report abuse
Made with Ecwid by Lightspeed