AWW21 Benevolence - Julie Janson

Based on the oral histories of the Darug people, Julie Janson has
said that her ambitious and illuminating new novel, Benevolence,
was written as an Aboriginal response to The Secret River.
Muraging – a character inspired by Julie’s own
great-great-grandmother – is given over to the Native Institution
as a pupil by her father, a “benevolent” institution providing
Christian discipline and education, and thereby becomes the first
person in the novel to be sacrificed to the good intentions of
the waibala.


Chaired by Caroline Baum