The Road from Coorain is an memoir written by Jill Ker Conway detailing her life as a child on the outback of Australia moving to the city. Her young life has numerous obstacles, from droughts to family tragedies. The author had led a fascinating life; I learned much about living in the outback - raising sheep and obtaining one's resources independently - and her story of growing up as a strong, intellectual woman in a chauvinistic age powerful.The memoir is well written; as a memoir, it appears to stay true to what she remembers. It doesn't seem to exaggerate events - but the memory recall appears so good she must have written in a journal.The dialogue is sparse, as should be the case with a life memoir - I wouldn't be able to remember exact wordings of conversations - but when it exists it is powerful. The diction is quite consistent. The author uses a honest, calm, reflective voice - she doesn't complain or gush - instead recalling past attitudes and using diction to convey a reflective tone on subjects. The book makes good use of tone and diction to convey the author's thoughts and emotions, giving the reader her attitude and opinions towards events and things directly in a voice that is both engaging and down to earth.The book, as a memoir of a life of a normal person, is one the reader feels for, but as a result it lacks much of the escapist elements that fiction usually possesses. It has no heart-pounding adventures, far reaching revelations, fantastical creatures, epic conflicts, futuristic predictions, or life-changing technologies - except perhaps antibiotics. For the most part, the author doesn't get into politics and doesn't dwell in controversies - a nice change, but bad for sales. Consequently, The Road from Coorain is a great book if the reader seeks a relatively calm atmosphere - such as slow reading before you sleep - if one doesn't like "slow" books, I wouldn't recommend it. However, it does have tragic moments, and a fair deal of emotion.The author writes in a way that is engaging, that reveals a honest account on her life. The prose is clear and direct rather than pompous and complex; the book is written more in the style of Hemmingway than Shakesphere. The most powerful part of the book is that it is based on real events written by the person who witnessed them, creating a more intimate relation with the protagonist - the author.In all, the Road from Coorain is a good book, engaging yet slow paced. If one loves memoirs, I would recommend this book as one of the best.
Excellent memoir of the outback childhood and Sydney schooling of a woman who became noted as a historian, feminist, and President of Smith College. The first third about Conway's pre-teen years on an 18,000 acre sheep farm in remote New South Wales in the 30's was most satisfying to me for its vibrant evocation of the beauties and struggles of rural family life. The isolation of their ranch encouraged self reliance, and when her brothers were sent off to school, she came to work closely with her father in the many complex tasks of ranching and wool production. The years of drought and depressed prices of the Depression tax the great resilience of the family. When her father dies, she assumes the role of her mother's main support. Eventually, when Jill and her mother are forced to move to Sydney, she slowly adapts to formal schooling and begins to find in academic achievement a path toward independence from her dominating mother . As she proceeds through adolescence into her college years, she evolves an aversion to the classism that places her among the privileged landowners, the sexism in the barriers to success in the field of history that she excels in, and internalized cultural inferiority that Australians experience with respect to the British imperialist mentality. As an autobiographical account of her developing values, this part of the book is as compelling as the childhood section; however, it is fascinating how she makes herself effectively a case study in the history of transformations in the social consciousness of Australians in the fifties. By the end of the book, she is headed to graduate school at Radcliffe to study the parallels and differences between Australian and American progression from British colonies. A sequel to the book was published as "True North".
What do You think about The Road From Coorain (1990)?
Solid memoir on growing up in 40s Australia, first in the Outback on a sheep farm that nearly collapses due to a long drought, then in Sydney as she tries to adjust to life a smart, pretty woman in a very chauvinistic academic world. She loses some important people way too early, and her mom begins to lose her grip on reality.I enjoyed the book and it was well written. I definitely liked it better when it was in Coorain, the sheep farm her parents bought and settled about 10 hours west of Sydney. A very different world, well described from a ten year old's perspective. When her fatherless family moved to Sydney, leaving the farm in caretaker's hands, the book bogged down for me. It became more of a "normal" story of the youngest daughter trying to come to grips with many pressures. While my growing up years were perfectly fine, I don't have any desire to relive them, either mine or someone else's, so even most "coming of age" movies leave me cool. But I persevered as she entered college and tried to figure out her path.The books ends as she gets on a plane to Boston, to begin her post-graduate work at Harvard. Oddly enough, she currently lives just down the road from me. A small world, and this book does a very nice job of explaining how it can become so.
—Jonathan
A fantastic and engaging memoir showing how Jill Ker Conway's early years on the sheep farm in Coorain, Australia helped shape her into the academic she later became here in the United States.This book starts off beautifully with in depth descriptions of the harsh Australian outback, a place I've never been, but would like to go, and through Ms. Conway's words I was there. Then the book ends with Jill Ker Conway leaving for America at age 26. I enjoyed the fact that education was fun for her, not an arduous process based on test scores, which seems to be the focus of education here in America. If it was more fun, I might of liked it more myself.However, I'm not going to lie, this is a heavy book. Ker Conway's life was plagued by loss and struggle, but even still, this is a beautifully and thoughtfully written memoir; a must read, and one I will venture back to from time to time.P.S. I read this book the first time in high school based on a reading list my English teacher made up for me because I had already read so many of the required titles and was dominating the in class discussions. However, I think I got so much more out of it this time around now that I'm older.
—Kate
It's hard to believe I haven't read this excellent memoir before. It pretty much has legendary classic standing here in Australia, in so far as a book by and about a woman breaking the mould of expectations can. Certainly it has that standing amongst people who care about the place of women in this often very conservative society.The isolation of the struggling rural property on which Kerr Conway spent her childhood meant that she didn't experience the sort of chronic put downs that most intelligent girls of her age (and later) would have faced during her early years. They came later once she was at school and university in Sydney. Her resourcefulness and resolve shine through the book, perhaps especially during difficult years after her father's death and her mother's loss of self (my own shorthand for hopelessness, dependence, manipulation through claimed weakness, alcoholism). It still takes courage for a woman to stand up publicly as a self-proclaimed intellectual in much of Australian society. How courageous she was, and how pleased I am I have read this at last.
—Lyn Elliott
