In 1787 Lieutenant Thomas Rooke sets sail from Portsmouth with the First Fleet and its cargo of convicts, destined for New South Wales. As a young officer and a man of science, the shy and quiet Rooke is full of anticipation about the natural wonders he might discover in this strange land on the other side of the world. After the fleet arrives in Port Jackson, Rooke sets up camp on a rocky and isolated point, and starts his work of astronomy and navigation. It's not too long before some of the Aboriginal people who live around the harbour pay him a visit. One of them, a girl named Tarunga, starts to teach him her own language. But her lessons and their friendship are interrupted when Rooke is given an order that will change his life forever. Inspired by the 1790 notebooks of William Dawes in which he recorded his conversations with a young Gadigal woman, The Lieutenant is a story about a man discovering his true self in extraordinary circumstances.
In 1787 Lieutenant Thomas Rooke sets sail from Portsmouth with the First Fleet and its cargo of convicts, destined for New South Wales. As a young officer and a man of science, the shy and quiet Rooke is full of anticipation about the natural wonders he might discover in this strange land on the other side of the world. After the fleet arrives in Port Jackson, Rooke sets up camp on a rocky and isolated point, and starts his work of astronomy and navigation. It's not too long before some of the Aboriginal people who live around the harbour pay him a visit. One of them, a girl named Tarunga, starts to teach him her own language. But her lessons and their friendship are interrupted when Rooke is given an order that will change his life forever. Inspired by the 1790 notebooks of William Dawes in which he recorded his conversations with a young Gadigal woman, The Lieutenant is a story about a man discovering his true self in extraordinary circumstances.
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In 1787 Lieutenant Daniel Rooke sets sail from Portsmouth with the First Fleet and its cargo of convicts, destined for New South Wales. As a young officer and a man of science, the shy and quiet Rooke is full of anticipation about the natural wonders he might discover in this strange land on the other side of the world. After the fleet arrives in Port Jackson, Rooke sets up camp on a rocky and isolated point, and starts his work of astronomy and navigation. It's not too long before some of the Aboriginal people who live around the harbour pay him a visit. One of them, a girl named Tagaran, starts to teach him her own language. But her lessons and their friendship are interrupted when Rooke is given an order that will change his life forever. Inspired by the 1790 notebooks of William Dawes in which he recorded his conversations with a young Gadigal woman, The Lieutenant is a story about a man discovering his true self in extraordinary circumstances.
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In 1787 Lieutenant Thomas Rooke sets sail from Portsmouth with the First Fleet and its cargo of convicts, destined for New South Wales. As a young officer and a man of science, the shy Rooke is full of anticipation about the wonders he might discover in this strange land. After the fleet arrives in Port Jackson, Rooke starts his work of astronomy and navigation. It’s not too long before some of the Aboriginal people who live around the harbour pay him a visit. One of them, a girl named Tagaran, starts to teach him her own language. But her lessons and their friendship are interrupted when Rooke is given an order that will change his life forever.
Notes
Originally published: Melbourne, Vic.: Text, 2008; Edinburgh: Canongate, 2009.
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... to squeeze gently the fingers of another person." This is a long winded explanation for the word "kamara", the Cadigal expression for something like 'my friend'. The Cadigal are one of Australia's aboriginal 'tribes' who Daniel Rooke, astronomer by passion and soldier by necessity, encounters after landing in New South Wales with the First Fleet in 1788. Rooke, a loner since childhood, highly intelligent and curious about science, but awkward in his dealings with people, is an unlikely hero for an engaging gentle story of first intercultural encounters with aboriginals as the new British administration struggles to establish the first settlement in Sydney Cove. In her typical gentle and sensitive writing Kate Grenville has achieved something admirable and exciting with this novel: by recreating a fictionalized version of the actual events of the time, she has shown how human beings can succeed in interacting across any language and cultural divide and as a result can develop friendships that will change them fundamentally.
Daniel Rooke, similar to William Thornhill in The Secret River, her 2005 award winning novel, is loosely based on a real person: William Dawes, a little known soldier with an keen interest in the stars, the strange natural beauty of the local environment and, last but not least, a talent for languages. He inspired and informed Grenville's fictional treatment of a subject matter that has not lost its importance for Australians since. Beyond the specifics of historical events, Grenville has imagined a beautifully rendered intimate account of "first contact" between two very distinct cultures realized by two unusual individuals, Rooke and a young aboriginal girl, Tagaran. In fact, Grenville came across Dawes' notebooks by chance while researching her earlier book. Whereas in SECRET RIVER the aboriginals are, while strongly in evidence, without a direct voice (because she refused to invent one for them), here Grenville has Dawes notes that describe his growing friendship with a group of Cadigals, and in particular Patyegarang, the model for the fictional Tagaran, and their, often playful, attempts at learning each others language. The fictional story is created around the unique direct dialog and Dawes/Rooke's reflections on language and meaning, clearly set off in the text by italic print.
Grenville evokes the calm that comes over the isolated outpost that Rooke has created for himself - a different world that makes him - and the reader - forget the reality of the early encounters between military and locals and the precarious situation the settlement finds itself in. Upon arrival Rooke had established a very basic observatory on a promontory close to, yet separated from, the new settlement at Syndey Cove. He had grown increasingly fond of this, his private space, "[a] place so strange [it] took a layer of skin off a man and left him peeled... where the solitude without matched the solitude within." Yet, it is also the starting point for a journey of discovery of his other inner self that will bring him both deep happiness and an existential, and unavoidable, moral dilemma.
Grenville does not ignore the "other world" beyond Rooke's hut and space: the tentative efforts by the Governor to establish communication with the locals, the military operations against prisoners and aboriginals, etc. She develops believable characters around Rooke, in particular Captain Talbot Silk, a friend of Rooke's from an earlier navy expedition. Based on the historical Watkin Tench, he is quite the opposite in character to Rooke: smooth talking, jovial and with a contract for a book chronicling their early experiences in the settlement. Events are not going well and, in the end, like Dawes himself, Rooke is confronted with a moral choice and his decision will decide his life's path from then on.
For me Grenville's novel came dramatically alive in the encounters between Rooke and the aboriginal group. The importance of that section carries through to the end. Anybody who has ever been an outsider within a completely foreign culture will relate to the hero's experience: the first efforts at communication, the misunderstandings, the children's whispering and repeating of words and phrases, reflecting their complete lack of experience with a person not familiar with their language, their gestures and customs. Grenville captures this combination of awe and elation on both sides magnificently. [Friederike Knabe]
Every now and then a book comes along that makes you want to tug on the next person you see and say, "You MUST read this!" The Lieutenant is that kind of book. It enraptured me and held me tightly in its grip so that by the end, its poignancy lingered...and I suspect will keep on doing so for quite some time.
The book focuses on the character of Daniel Rooke, a loner and an outsider, a man who cannot seem to find his rightful place in life. He has a natural affinity with astronomy and the stars; his gift lies in measuring, calculating, and deducing. Eventually, he finds his way to the marines and journeys with them to New South Wales as a lieutenant. Even there, he stays distant from his fellow countrymen, preferring to live alone in his own observatory.
Gradually, Rooke becomes fascinated with the natives and they, in turn, with him. For the first time of his life, he makes a real connection...with the eldest of the native children -- a girl named Tagaran, whose intelligence and understanding is like quicksilver. With Tagaran as a conduit, he begins to decipher and learn the language. He discovers "you did not learn a language without entering into a relationship with the people who spoke it with you.Learning a language was not a matter of joining any two points with a line. It was a leap into the other."
As Rooke learns the language of connection, he also learns the language of doubt. He finds that his countrymen aren't noble or good or righteous. When he is asked to join in on a heinous act, he reflects: "It is the simplest thing in the world. If an action was wrong, it does not matter whether it succeeded or not, or how many clever steps you took to make sure it failed. If you were part of such an act, you were part of its wrong."
The Lieutenant is nothing less than a roadmap on what it means to be human. It is about how everything finds its place with everything else. And, in our era of shifting ethics and morality, it is a searingly powerful lesson on how to stand up for what we know is true and right. The book is based on the story of a real life young lieutenant, William Dawes, and Ms. Grenville has made extensive use of Dawes' language notebooks. Read this book now and be richer for it!
a wonderful central character in a well written novel
5/5
Amazon
Aleksandra Nita-Lazar
(MD, USA)
How could I ignore Kate Grenville until now? I am so happy I have read "The Lieutenant", and I have known about "The Secret River" for a long time. Now I will read all her books...
"The Lieutenant" based on facts from Australia's early colonization, is a story of Daniel Rooke from Portsmouth, England. Intellectually superior to his peers, Rooke had been singled out at school because of his extraordinary mathematical abilities. He became a scholar among the marines and his passion for astronomy and numbers, together with his high morals and natural curiosity provided him with rich, adventurous, good life. Although always an outsider, perceived as a weirdo in childhood, Rooke earned respect among the marines as a great navigator. Fighting in the American Revolution on the British side, he vowed not to be in a battle again, so when the Royal Astronomer recommended him to the party colonizing New South Wales as an astronomer with the task to look for a comet, he eagerly agreed.
The new setting in Sydney Cove was a challenge to Rooke and the whole expedition. However, Daniel Rooke found there friendship and understanding he would remember on his deathbed...
Rooke's connection with Tagaran, a young girl from the native tribe, resulted in his study of the tribe's language, and his improvements in interpersonal relations. Rooke, a sensitive, but alienated man, was deeply moved by the displays of cruelty and his friendship with Tagaran triggered his active fight for human rights.
Kate Grenville based her novel on the life of a real Marine officer, William Dawes, who laid the foundation for learning the Aboriginal language - his study was the most comprehensive of all around his time, and his notes show the relationship with the native girl. Dawes was also later fighting for abolition of slavery in Antigua and died in poverty. Grenville wrote about him - as Daniel Rooke-with great affection, and subtlety. Her portrait of the man of great intelligence and respect for human rights is moving and engrossing. I liked Daniel Rooke instantly; he is an unforgettable character. The novel is also marvelous, a piece of Australian history intertwined with a man's life in wonderful, balanced prose.
The Argus (Melbourne,..., Friday 7 May 1909 p 5 ... FICTION OF THE DAY. -«-__ FRIENDSHIP OR LOVE. Mr. John Barnett whose hose last published ed volume ... the friendship and occasion ti com panionslup of the most popular jouth in the school one lg|,ulden ... friendly Gcoffrei Clicnlon hovvevci accepts the friendship as a gift from the gods, and the reason foi it ... 1051 words
The Argus (Melbourne,..., Friday 9 November 1917 p 5 ... FICTION OF THE DAY. LOVE AND FRIENDSHIP. A thoughtful and interesting study of two women in an unusual and difficult relationship lationship is i presented in E. S. Stevens's new novel, "The Safety ... and her friendship nnd gratitude totvards Agnes. The scene of the greater part of the story is laid ... 1010 words
Astronomers All Over The World Are Preparing To Have.... A CLOSER LOOK AT MARS By A STAFF CORRESPONDENT
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The Sydney Morning Herald..., Friday 18 June 1954 p 10 ... Astronomers All Over The World Are Preparing To A CLOSER LOOK AT MARS r By A STAFF CORRESPONDENT ... ever before. ASTRONOMERS STRONOMERS are already ?^ ready watching the planet as it cornes daily nearer the earth. On July 2 Mars will be a mere 40 million miles from the earth, and then with astronomers ... 1208 words