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 A magnificent achievement June 4, 2008
Robert Hughes has written a towering account of the years during which Britain transported convicts to Australia, thereby beginning the colonization of a continent that would one day hold a place among the world's free nations. Hughes's fascinating text covers the exaggerated fear of a "criminal class" that, along with hopes of establishing a colonial presence in the region, caused England to spend so much treasure on the system of transportation. We also get much fascinating information about the difficult conditions on the new continent, the shameful treatment of the native Aborigines, and many harrowing accounts of the horrendous treatment prisoners received there. In the end, a rising tide of public disapproval and a gold rush that weakened the system's financial incentive resulted in the end of transportation. Hughes treats all of this--and much more--in exhaustive detail that is never dull. With the eye of a novelist, he includes the stories of many interesting figures from Australian history, fully contextualized within the epic sweep of his narrative. This book is a real winner.
 exaggerated emphasis on blood April 26, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
There's no doubt that the lash and hangman's rope played an important role in early New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania). About 1830, the death rate by execution was about 1 per 1000 of the European population of NSW (30 per year out of 30,000). The first criminal trial in Australia led to a sentence of 150 lashes for being drunk and abusive. Thus began the operation of law in Australia, only a fortnight after the colony commenced. But a few months later, in Cable v Sinclair, two young convicts successfully sued the master of a first fleet ship because their luggage had gone missing on the voyage. English law would not have allowed attainted convicts to sue, let alone hold property. One of those convicts, Henry Kable, went on to a career as constable, jailer and merchant, even if his finances did crash spectacularly. This was a new land with a new approach to law and egalitarianism.
Hughes emphasises blood and the lash, glorying in it. He tells a great story, like an airport novel. But he doesn't tell us anything about the ordinary social and commercial life which began so quickly after the first colony began in 1788. He tells only half the story, and as a result, academic historians ignore his work. There are many much better histories of convict Australia than this. Try Grace Karskens, The Rocks, for a start.
Some of the men and women of early NSW were dishonest, gaining what they could when they could. That applied to officers as well as convicts. But they had relationships (often without marriage) and children, developed trade, lived their lives as well as they could. The surprise is that the place was so successful, not that it was so bloody. And of course the most significant blood lost was that of the indigenous people, a story not unique to Australia.
 Very Enlightening Read April 7, 2008
In short this book has taught me a great deal about the history of Australia and I totally disagree with other reviews that make out it is biased in some way.
Found the book to be frank, open, honest and to the point.
BTW even though the book is very thick it was not a chore to read and finish.
Cultural Amnesia January 26, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The Fatal Shore: The Epic of Australia's Founding
By Robert Hughes
Australia is one of those faraway places you read about in National Geographic or watch on Discovery. Remote, exotic, modern yet solidly based in its history, it's a chamber of commerce promotion writer's dream. T he only country to occupy an entire continent... spanning from the Pacific to the Indian Oceans; sophisticated and modern along the coast with Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane; forbidding and undeveloped in The Outback; boasting symphonies, opera, and architecture; an outdoorsman's paradise.
Robert Hughes, the Art Critic for TIME magazine, has done an outstanding service in chronicling the rich history of his homeland.
The Australian writer has delved deeply into primary sources including diaries of those unfortunates who fell victim to the System of Transportation: the official euphemism for the forced removal of mostly minor criminals from England and (particularly) Ireland to the distant and fatal shores of the new continent.
In researching "diasporas," I've discovered artificial "homelands" for Esquimos in Canada, "Little Cubas' in Miami; the relocated Acadian ("Cajun") culture of the Mississippi delta, and new asian cultures in the American Midwest.
But Australia really qualifies: the indigenous population, the Aboriginals, like our Native Americans were run off their land, deprived of their rights, and forced to give up their culture. The rest came in rusty "Hellships" -overcrowded, prone to disease, starvation, physical and sexual abuse, it's amazing so many arrived alive.
And when they did get there they found the horrendous penal colonies of Norfolk Island and Van Diemen's Land, where they worked as indentured servants until winning freedom.
For years, Hughes tells us, Australia underwent a collective cultural amnesia about its past, sweeping the darker side of The System under the rug. But gradually they came to terms with "The convict Stain," accepting their beginnings, and in the process developing a great nation. Those who have seen the Mel Gibson movie "Gallipoli" will understand how Australia's sense of identity was forged on the hellish trenches and beaches of the First World War. As I write, Australia is celebrating "Australia Day"...not colonial day, or Queensland Day, or something else from Europe.
The Fatal Shore is first-rate history and first-rate writing. (We're lucky to have Hughes still among us: he was seriously injured and almost died after a car accident in Australia)
*****
Very strong research but with a dense and morbid writing cadance July 14, 2007
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Robert Hughes' The Fatal Shore is an assiduously and tirelessly researched work on the Western "founding" of Australia through essentially an experiment with a penal colony. Hughes obviously has written, to date, the finest and most exhaustive piece on the wonderfully interesting, albeit terrifying, beginnings of the country Down Under. All of this said, while the research is almost beyond the scope of critical analysis, the writing surely is not.
This book, not unlike Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago is dense, and not simply in an academic sense. Hughes drones on and on with anecdotal writings of many of the criminal on "transportation", their keepers and eventually, the settlers. While much of this is interesting the author greatly fails the reader with redundancy - his take seems to be where two would be good, ten would be better. As such, the book drags. It seems almost sacrilege to say anything derogatory about this work (or Solzhenitsyn's as well) as the topics are covered incredibly well. But it seems the reader is not considered, only the research.
The writing aside, readers will come away with a unique and strong base of information on the founding of Australia and the timing of it. Hughes also does a terrific job of showing how the American Revolution influenced London decision makers to embark on such a large task and traces the increase in crime in the late 18th century and early 19th century throughout England, but in London specifically. This is a book that, while good, is quite dense. It is a task to read and is not up to all the accolades critics seem to shower upon it.
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