The Fatal Shore: The Epic of Australia's Founding by Robert Hughes Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of The Fatal Shore: The Epic of Australia's Founding
Book Review: A must read for non-fiction lovers
Summary: 5 Stars
This colorful and splendidly researched history of Australia's founding is breathtaking in its scope. The book is not only a story of Australia's beginnings, but an impressively researched history on the political pressures in England that led to the founding of Australia as a penal colony and of the struggles over penal reform. Perhaps most fascinating, and Hughes never fails to communicate his own sense of fascination, is the microcosm Australia offers as a society founded from wholecloth and how it evolved into a complex society. I read this book right after reading Son of the Morning Star (another superb book) and was very much struck between the parallels between how Americans who settled the West viewed and treated Native Americans and the Australian settlers' views of the aborigines whom they slowly but surely displaced. The wonderful stories would stand on their own even if ineptly told, but they really come alive with Hughes' writing style, which would be the pride of any novelist...Bravo!Book Review: Read also:
Summary: 4 Stars
Did you like the facts in 'The Fatal Shore'? Then you should also read 'His Natural Life' by Marcus Clarke. Though factfiction, this book goes on where Mr. Hughes' left us.Book Review: A blunt, fascinating and amazingly well-done work of history
Summary: 5 Stars
Fatal Shore is a rare achievement in history writing: truly fascinating history by a wonderful writer. As a Time magazine writer and art critic, Robert Hughes obviously knows his way around the English language and shows it by crafting readable, entertaining history. But the book's true strength lies in Hughes' -- who is Australian -- brutally honest assessment of his country's fascinating founding. Hughes' voice makes the reader feel like he is getting Australia's story from the famously blunt lips of an Aussie over a few beers in an outback tavern. And why not? Good history SHOULD be brutally honest, not watered down with political correctness or the dry touch of an academic. Particularly strong are sections in which Hughes tears down the fiction -- created by Australians as an defensive reflex against their less-than-proud background -- which says the country's first convict citizens were mostly unjustly convicted and primarily political prisoners. The book is peppered throughout with gritty anecdotes and based on solid and extensive research. I had no idea Australia's founding was this interesting. Hughes shows us what an incredible tale it really was.Book Review: Hughes vs. Hughes
Summary: 3 Stars
Much as I enjoyed this work, and as informative as it is bound to be to any American reader who grew up learning nothing of the history of Australia, I found Hughes' violent swings of attitude about the colonization of his native land to be a major drawback. He simply can't make up his mind as to whether settling Australia with convicts was a good idea, a bad one, or something in between. He sometimes goes from pole to pole in a single paragraph.Book Review: RH's "The Fatal Shore" made learning history a pleasure!
Summary: 5 Stars
I have travelled to Australia, thus far, eight times since 1990. In all of my travels I have focused on learning the evolutionary significance of Australia's fascinating fauna, as well as the the culture of its people, past and present. But in all of my travels in Australia (I have yet to go to Tasmania) I have never learned so much about its people (non-Aboriginal) and their colonization, as I have from reading The Fatal Shore. I am not, by any stretch of the imagination, a historian or even one who "likes" history. But Robert Hughes's book was so well written, and so insightful, that I can truly say I could not put it down. What I learned from this book really put my travels to Australia in perspective, and it made me want to learn so much more. If I could, I would give this book ten stars! This book is an absolute must-read for anyone who is interested in travel to Australia, or wants simply to learn about Australia's fascinating, albeit horrific, past. Robert Hughes has quite a talent for impecable research as well as for bringing his readers into the heart of unimaginable horrors. Australians need not be ashamed of their past (as is implied in the book) - on the contrary - they should relish in their success as a colorful and awe-inspiring nation (which is something they already do)!