The Secret River Sparknotes

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Andrew Bovell’s stage adaption of Kate Grenville’s award-winning novel, The Secret River is “a stunning, shattering piece of theatre that goes to the heart of our history”. Audiences are emotionally and mentally challenged with the uncompromising story of cruelty and tragedy, presented through Australian and Indigenous realism style.
This was accomplished through the this through the powerful and complex character representation, creating difference from Grenville’s narrative to the show and elaborate production elements

Grenville created a collection of influential characters in her book, and when implemented through the Australian and Indigenous realism style gave audience a candid revelation of Australia’s deplorable past.
The protagonist
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His hopeful view is inspired by Thomas Blackwood and Dick Thornhill his youngest son, both freely connected to the Dharug people. They resist leaving so his neighbour Smasher Sullivan suggests buying his guard dogs. Thornhill does decide on purchase the dogs and on being there discovers a captured and abused Dharug women tied up similar to the dogs he was there to purchase. He ignores and suppresses this sight like many other horrifying barbarisms committed against the natives. Smasher keeps pushing to rid the Natives of the land and eventually Thornhill is persuaded from fear of losing his family and freedom. “Once Grenville has placed us so surely in Thornhill’s shoes, she leads us into moral peril for we find ourselves identifying with the decisions he makes. We may not agree with them but we understand them. And so we come to understand that the violence of the past was not undertaken by evil men, …show more content…
The constant flowing and ever-changing sound track was excellent at creating mood and tension throughout all scenes of the performance. The cast’s use of traditional English nursery rhymes such as ‘My Fair Lady’ and traditional Indigenous songs gave a memorable performance. Starting with light and happy songs at the beginning the two families are able to depict their culture to the audience. But when the two culture’s songs are overlapped they make an unpleasant sound, “foreshadowing the ways in which the two families and their cultures will clash.” (H Brown, 2016). One of the most unforgettable moments in the play was when Thornhill, Smasher and other English settlers of the Hawkesbury river take action against the Dharug people. During the massacre ‘My Fair Lady’ starting at the back of the stage and ever so slowly moving forward and crescendoing their song turning to yelling and the music of the piano becomes deranged and scattered all over the place. “What is supposed to be an innocent children’s rhyme contrasts with the appalling violence of the massacre and further serves to shock the audience and make them reflect on the brutality of the crime.” (H Brown, 2016). This one scene almost shows the essence of the play, the beginning of the singing being soft and to the audience, symbolic of when the settlers inhabited the indigenous land. Then becomes loud and violent emblematic of the misunderstanding between the

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