Dark Emu by Bruce PascoeMy rating: 2 of 5 stars
I started reading this book with quite positive approach.
Earlier I found many accusations questioning Aboriginal origin of the author so I looked in the book for a mention of it and using it to author's advantage.
Did not find any so I consider this issue as completely irrelevant to the contents of the book.
As for the book I was disappointed with amount of rhetoric compared to factual analysis.
Actually my feeling is, that for presenting the the facts plus objective analysis, 50 pages would be enough.
Another point is constant accusation of colonizers for their behaviour, ignorance and misjudgements.
Well, that is how European people were 200+ years ago regardless of their nationality and the county they colonized.
As for presented facts... I did not find too many surprises.
One of them was mention of sizes of some buildings.
Here I would question one case - "...Sturt had seen a sophisticated village of seventy domed huts... each capable of housing up to fifteen people (...) they were eight to ten feet in diameter, and about four and a half feet high.."
Ten feet in diameter, and a fire in the middle, and fifteen people around? Sorry but I cannot see more than 4 very squeezed people there.
Author mentioned , I think once only, about animals held in enclosures close to homes, but he never mentioned what animals were held there.
Author raised a number of quite relevant questions - why Australia is so shy with mass scale production of kangaroo meat?
I fully agree - why?
Answer looks easy - opposition of existing meat industry.
Another author's question - why there are practically no restaurants offering Aboriginal food?
Here I do not find answer, my feeling is that it would be a business success. So why no ABoriginal community tried?
Summary, I would rate this book much higher, close to 4 stars if redundant rhetoric was reduced.
And final point - "..incident occurred at a latitude of 127 degrees 47 minutes south...".
Could someone find this latitude, please!
South end of my map reaches South Pole at 90 degrees south.
It is obvious error of the publisher (Magabala Books), from other details I deducted, that the real coordinates were 27 degrees 47 minutes.
I would expect that they could have paid a bit more attention in editing so important and popular book.
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Agree. I understand the value of oral history, but it can't stand on its own, or it becomes about as reliable as my own memories of WWII. In other words, stuff I remember from my parents, who were actually involved in in, and from books I've read and stories I've heard. You're right - this is an important book, but maybe less as an althernative history than as the beginning of a shared history.
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