Other editions of book The Kangaroo

Excerpt from KangarooA bunch Of workmen were lying on the grass Of the park beside Macquarie Street, in the dinner hour. It was winter, the end of May, but the sun was warm, and they lay there in shirt - sleeves, talking. Some were eating food from paper packages. They were a mixed lot - taxi drivers, a group of builders who were putting a new inside into one of the big houses opposite, and then two men in blue overalls, some sort of mechanics. Squatting and lying on the grassy bank beside the broad tarred road where taxis and hansom cabs passed continually, they had that air of owning the city which belongs to a good Australian.Sometimes, from the distance behind them, came the faintest squeal of singing from out Of the fortified Conservatorium of Music. Perhaps it was one of these faintly wafted squeals that made a blue - overalled fellow look round, lifting his thick eyebrows vacantly. His eyes immediately rested on two figures approaching from the direction of the conservatorium, across the grass-lawn. One was a mature, handsome, fresh-faced woman, who might have been Russian. Her companion was a smallish1 man, pale-faced, with a dark beard. Both were well dressed, and quiet, with that quiet self-possession which is almost unnatural nowadays. They looked different from other people.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Kangaroo is an account of a visit to New South Wales by an English writer named Richard Lovat Somers and his German wife Harriet in the early 1920s. This appears to be semi-autobiographical, based on a three-month visit to Australia by Lawrence and his wife Frieda, in 1922. Australian journalist Robert Darroch – in several articles in the late 1970s, and a 1981 book entitled D.H. Lawrence in Australia – claimed that Lawrence based Kangaroo on real people and events he witnessed in Australia. "Kangaroo" is the fictional nickname of one of Lawrence's characters, Benjamin Cooley, a prominent ex-soldier and lawyer, who is also the leader of a secretive, fascist paramilitary organisation, the "Diggers Club".

"Kangaroo" by D. H. Lawrence. Published by Good Press. Good Press publishes a wide range of titles that encompasses every genre. From well-known classics & literary fiction and non-fiction to forgotten−or yet undiscovered gems−of world literature, we issue the books that need to be read. Each Good Press edition has been meticulously edited and formatted to boost readability for all e-readers and devices. Our goal is to produce eBooks that are user-friendly and accessible to everyone in a high-quality digital format.

Kangaroo is a novel by D. H. Lawrence, first published in 1923. It is set in Australia.Kangaroo is an account of a visit to New South Wales by an English writer named Richard Lovat Somers and his German wife Harriet in the early 1920s. This appears to be semi-autobiographical, based on a three-month visit to Australia by Lawrence and his wife Frieda, in 1922. The novel includes a chapter ("Nightmare") describing the Somers' experiences in wartime St Ives, Cornwall, vivid descriptions of the Australian landscape, and Richard Somers' sceptical reflections on fringe politics in Sydney. Kangaroo's movement, and the "great general emotion" of Kangaroo himself, do not appeal to Somers, and in this the novel begins to reflect Lawrence's own experiences during World War I. Somers also rejects the socialism of Struthers, which emphasises "generalised love".Australian journalist Robert Darroch – in several articles in the late 1970s, and a 1981 book entitled D.H. Lawrence in Australia – claimed that Lawrence based Kangaroo on real people and events he witnessed in Australia. The extent to which this is true remains a matter of controversy – particularly by Joseph Davis in his 1989 D. H. Lawrence at Thirroul. Davis is sympathetic to the view that "Kangaroo" may be based on real events but argues that it is impossible that Lawrence had time to meet clandestine political leaders in Sydney when he was too busy writing his novel in Thirroul. Davis feels it is more likely to have been a local south-coast identity associated with Thirroul who would have provided some of the details of Lawrence's political plot."Kangaroo" is the fictional nickname of one of Lawrence's characters, Benjamin Cooley, a prominent ex-soldier and lawyer, who is also the leader of a secretive, fascist paramilitary organisation, the "Diggers Club". Cooley fascinates Somers, but he maintains his distance from the movement itself. It has been suggested by Darroch and others that Cooley was based on Major General Charles Rosenthal, a notable World War I leader and right-wing activist. It has also been alleged that Rosenthal was involved with the Old Guard, a secret anti-communist militia.Similarly, according to Darroch, the character of Jack Calcott – who is the Somers' neighbour in Sydney and introduces Richard Somers to Cooley – may have been based on a controversial Australian military figure, Major John Scott, who was both an associate of Rosenthal and an Old Guard official. Another central character is Willie Struthers, a left-wing activist reputed to have been based partly on Willem Siebenhaar, who made Lawrence's acquaintance in Western Australia.Kangaroo is sometimes cited as an influence on the Jindyworobak movement, an Australian nationalist literary group, which emerged about a decade later. Gideon Haigh saw fit to dub it "one of the sharpest fictional visions of the country and its people".It was adapted as a film, also called Kangaroo, in 1986, featuring Colin Friels as Somers, Judy Davis as Harriet and Hugh Keays-Byrne as "Kangaroo". (wikipedia.org)

Rootless, restless, nomadic, longing to escape the decay of post-war Europe, Richard and Harriet Somers flee to Australia, hoping to begin a new and freer life. Richard, a disillusioned writer, is drawn into an extreme political group headed by the enigmatic Kangaroo. In his search for ideal love, both brotherly and personal, Somers finds himself both attracted and repelled by Kangaroo – with terrifying consequences. This is D. H. Lawrence’s eighth novel, set in Australia. He wrote the first draft in just forty-five days while living south of Sydney and revised it three months later in New Mexico. The descriptions of the country are vivid and sympathetic and the book fuses lightly disguised autobiography with an exploration of political ideas at an immensely personal level.

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