His Natural Life

From the blurb:His Natural Life has retained Australian classic status for over one hundred years. Scarcely ever out of print since first written during the early 1870s, it has provided successive generations with a vivid account of a brutal phase of colonial life. The main focus of this great convict novel is the complex interaction between those in power and those who suffer, made meaningful because of the hero's struggle against the destructiveness of his wrongful imprisonment. While much of the story is necessarily grim, Marcus Clarke has used elements of romance, incidents of family life and passages of scenic description to both relieve and give emphasis to the tragedy that forms its heart.The novel was not immediately successful. Clarke was criticised for choosing an unpopular subject as well as for his harsh description of unrelenting cruelty, prompting him to add an appendix listing documentary sources. But there was to be a gradual appreciation of the lasting nature of the work, especially after his premature death in 1881. His chosen title was extended to For the Term of His Natural Life by the London publisher George Bentley.This is the first full-scale critical edition which restores the original version revised by Clarke for the first book edition, published in Melbourne in 1874. It includes a comprehensive introduction, detailed explanatory notes, a record of variants in later editions, and a comparison with the much longer Australian Journal serialisation of 1870-72. There are accompanying essays on the historical basis of the novel by Michael Roe and its adaptation to stage and screen by Elizabeth Webby.