A
rich and complex work that incorporates themes of feminism, national identity
and transnational socio-politics into a hugely compelling narrative.
The
Peastick Girl
Michelle
Austin
Transnational
Literature,
Vol. 6, No. 1, November 2013
Susan
Hancock’s novel is a rich and complex work that incorporates themes of
feminism, national identity and transnational socio-politics into a hugely
compelling narrative framework. Set in Wellington, New Zealand, the story
concerns Teresa, Mollie and Cass Matheson, the three daughters of the
mysteriously deceased Vivien Matheson. Each of these three main characters
has their own distinct identity but, collectively, the strong and sometimes
endearing characterisation works to construct a positive image of women and sisterhood.
The
middle sister, Teresa, is given the central role, returning from Australia,
where she has been living for five years and where she believes she has
discovered a demon called Arkeum. Teresa’s return opens the narrative and her
emotions are the driving force of the plot as she is shown to be a troubled
figure who has suffered a traumatic experience that has left her
psychologically and physically damaged. On returning home she is able to
resolve some of the tensions in her family and to discover the secrets kept
from her by her mother which have, unknown to her, continued to affect her
throughout the rest of her life. The events of her past slowly return to
haunt her during the course of this discovery as she struggles to resolve an
intense psychological division between her angry and seizure riddled Red
Queen persona, and her other, innocent and more fragile self, the Peastick
Girl.
One
of the wonderful points of this story is the way that the natural beauty of
Teresa’s homeland is able to heal and soothe her at a tumultuous point in her
life. Nature is an important motif in this novel and the descriptions of the
country occur in connection with peaceful scenes to offset Teresa’s emotional
state of disturbance and unrest. This complex relationship between the
natural world and the emotional and social disturbance of otherwise peaceful
people, then, has parallels with the social and semi-political issues that
appear subtly but noticeably in the background of the novel. This is
interjected with specific debates concerning the plight of Maori women and
the need for them to regain the power that was stripped from them under
British law. The Maori issue is conjoined with the idea of natural and native
New Zealand life, while the contrasts and affinities between the novel’s main
characters and the more peripheral figures of Maori women are shown to be of
principal importance for reasons concerning both feminism and nationality.
Cass is a filmmaker whose most recent project is a film about the Maori people.
She is the figure to whom the author assigns the responsibility of reminding
her two sisters about the feminism with which their mother raised them. She
is also the character who continually asks important questions about women’s
treatment of each other and the meaning of feminism and femaleness in
contemporary society.
In
outlining some of the problems caused by colonisation, Hancock’s novel makes
key reference to New Zealand’s political and social history and considers the
effect of this on Maori women within the more established white Western
women’s movement. The novel positions this issue in order to suggest that
colonisation and the subsequent imposition of British, and largely Victorian,
values concerning marriage, morality and gender roles has had adverse effects
on the position and rights of all New Zealand born women.
At
the same time, the male attitudes to women in this novel, though few, are
shown to be less than egalitarian. Teresa, for example, is harshly criticised
by Gil, the philandering but prudish husband of her older sister, Mollie. He
makes sporadic and multifarious judgements in relation to her attitude to
life, her previous experiences with drugs and what he sees as her sexual
promiscuity, thereby demonstrating one male perspective on the moral and
largely gender specific values to which women are still expected to adhere.
Mollie offers a contrast to Teresa’s freer and more adventurous persona,
being described as a housewife and mother whose opinions are, in some ways,
informed and confined by her husband’s patriarchal and occasionally
hypocritical values.
The
problems of women, and the constriction that they feel, come to the forefront
here, lending the novel a sympathetic tone which inspires a similarly
sisterly affinity and understanding in the reader. It is this that makes the
novel such a pleasure to read as it is so clearly female orientated and
provides a warm and enveloping story with enough mystery at its heart to make
it absorbing and enjoyable. The narrative tone engages the reader and
inspires the imagination in such a way that scenes and characters come to
life. Its overall effect is, therefore, a powerful one, working to promote
understanding of the distinctive identity of New Zealand and its people while
at the same time encouraging readers to discover more about the country and
its history.
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THE
PEASTICK GIRL
by
SUSAN HANCOCK
494
pgs ISBN 9781876044749
RRP
$34.95
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Teresa
has returned to her native Wellington and her sisters Mollie and Cass after
five years in Melbourne to questions of self, solitude and origin. The
powerful and sinister figure of her mother and her mysterious death hovers
over the whole scene.
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A
brave, sensuous and wildly original novel. I’ve never read anything quite
like it.
Helen Garner
Where
novels are concerned, a lot more attention should be paid to Susan Hancock’s The
Peastick Girl. Written in prose of eloquent intensity, this does for New
Zealand passions and landscapes the kind of thing the Brontës did for
Yorkshire.
Chris Wallace-Crabbe, The Age, 8 December 2012
The Age’s Recommended Books of the Year
Wellington
is as central to this novel as Egdon Heath is to Hardy’s Return of the
Native... Katherine Mansfield’s city has become a wild place dominated by
rain, light, wind and sound. Teresa’s house is a permeable membrane open to
all weathers, a mere shack whose roof leaks and windows blow in, and through
which disturbing memories swirl.
Rod Edmond, New Zealand Studies Network (UK)
A
constant living presence on practically every page... as intense a story as
one could imagine.
Vincent O’Sullivan
Susan
Hancock’s debut novel is ambitious and extraordinary... The novel’s scale and
scope are Joycean.
Felicity Plunkett, The Canberra Times
Hard
not to be blown away by this staggeringly beautiful novel...by the scale of
this superb work of art... An impressive cast of finely nuanced characters...
Narratives of violence and dispossession.
Marion Campbell
This
highly gifted novel... is given a lustre and intensity by her precise,
musical prose, with its matchless evocations of the weather and the
landscapes around Wellington and the fugitive subtleties of her characters’
inner lives.
Owen Richardson, The Age
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Former leading New Zealand publisher and bookseller, and widely experienced judge of both the Commonwealth Writers Prize and the Montana New Zealand Book Awards, talks about what he is currently reading, what impresses him and what doesn't, along with chat about the international English language book scene, and links to sites of interest to booklovers.
Wednesday, November 13, 2013
The Peastick Girl by Susan Hancock reviewed in Transnational Literature
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