Reviewed by Rama Gaind.
By John Kinsella, Transit Lounge, $29.99.
John Kinsella displays an engaging comprehension about environmental conservation, rural politics and the meaning of supplanting and assimilating. He is articulate in his observations, as this atypical memoir of his rural life takes us deep into the heart of what it means to ‘belong and unbelong’.
What is striking is the detailed observations of daily life, the engagement with topography and flora and fauna that embody the author’s conviction that ‘all is in everything and that every leaf of grass is vital’.
While centred on Jam Tree Gully in rural Western Australia, the memoir also moves between Ohio, Schull and Cambridge, mixing regionalism with an international sense of responsibility
Kinsella never shies from writing about the violence and intolerance of those scared of difference, and the ways in which his ethics at times been regarded with disdain or outright hostility. Through it all, with nuance and humour he also celebrates rural community and its willingness to lend a hand.
Having lived on rural property for most of his life, Kinsella feels a kinship to the farming community of Western Australia, having helped out on other properties along with his brother, Stephen.
Writing is Kinsella’s way of expressing opinion and sparking conversation. The delights and toils of childhood, adult addictions, missteps and changing directions are intensely captured in stirring and poetic detail.
At once considerate, vital and intellectual, Displaced is ultimately a call to personal action. It’s challenging, raw and explicitly honest in its interpretation of local and national events
In which state is the farming community for which Kinsella feels a kinship? If your answer is correct, then you could win one of two copies of Displaced. Entries should be sent to [email protected] by Monday, 17 August 2020. Names of the winners will be announced in Frank Cassidy’s PS-sssst…! column on 18 August 2020.
