True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey

Second reading; first read about 2002.


Ned Kelly is a well known outlaw in Australia, having much the same status down under as the U.S. outlaws Jessie James and Billy the Kid. Some consider him a common thief and murderer (bushranger in Australian lingo), and some consider him a folk hero who was persecuted by the ruling British because of his lowly Irish origins. Many documented facts exist about his life of crime, which began at age 15 and ended with his hanging at age 26. Carey supplies the in-between, gathered from legend and hearsay and his own imagination, to provide Ned Kelly's motivations and misadventures which led to his life of crime. Carey utilizes a fictional "found" group of hand-written reminiscences, purportedly written by Kelly before his death to explain himself to his small daughter.

Thus the novel is written in the supposed language of Ned Kelly, who has been only marginally educated. Punctuation is largely absent, making it very slow reading. The strangest thing, though, is that Ned Kelly seems to know how to spell very well. For this reason and others, I never succeeded in believing I was actually reading the words of Ned Kelly. I was always aware I was reading a novel. It actually became somewhat tedious after a bit, as event after event was recounted.

Since Ned Kelly's final capture is told of in the prologue of the novel, there was no suspense. Since I never fully bought into the supposed Ned Kelly narrative, there was no immersion into the action. I think I must have enjoyed this novel more the first time I read it, but this time I found it, quite honestly, to be a chore.

True History of the Kelly Gang won England's Booker prize in 2001, beating out Ian McEwan's Atonement and David Mitchell's number9dream, two of my favorite books. I don't know what they were thinking!