Oscar and Lucinda

Plot

The book tells the story of Oscar Hopkins, an Anglican priest from Devon, England, and Lucinda Leplastrier, a young Australian heiress from Parramatta.

They meet on a ship from England to Australia. Lucinda is the owner of a glass factory in Sydney and is returning from a commercial trip to London. Oscar grew up as the son of a fundamentalist Plymouth Brethren minister and naturalist, who believes he has joined a more compassionate church with the Anglicans.

The travellers discover that they are both gamblers, one obsessive, the other compulsive. Lucinda bets Oscar that he cannot transport a glass church from Sydney to a remote settlement at Bellingen, some 400 km up the New South Wales coast. This bet changes both their lives forever.

Inspiration

A reviewer for The Guardian commented that the novel was influenced by Father and Son, the autobiography of the English poet Edmund Gosse. The poet described his relation with his father, naturalist and minister Philip Henry Gosse.

Carey also noted in his novel some material that he took directly from a book of natural history by the senior Gosse. He concentrates on visual descriptions and information, with glass as a major image and metaphor.

Adaptation

Main article: Oscar and Lucinda (film)

The novel was adapted nine years later into a film of the same name, released in 1997. It was directed by Gillian Armstrong and starred Ralph Fiennes, Cate Blanchett, and Tom Wilkinson.

References

References

1. Strongman, Luke. (22 May 2002). "The Booker Prize and the Legacy of Empire". Rodopi.
2. Hassall, Anthony J.. (22 May 1998). "Dancing on Hot Macadam: Peter Carey's Fiction". Univ. of Queensland Press.
3. Snodgrass, Mary Ellen. (10 March 2010). "Peter Carey: A Literary Companion". McFarland.
4. Mullan, John. (13 February 2010). "Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey {{!}} Bookclub". The Guardian.
5. Meinig, Sigrun. (22 May 2004). "Witnessing the Past: History and Post-colonialism in Australian Historical Novels". Gunter Narr Verlag.