The Road To Coorain

You've recently learned what I did on my vacation, so now, perhaps, we'll have a bit of a book report. Later - macaroni art and a little snack.

Before I left the U.S., a great friend gave me a secondhand copy (the best kind!) of a book she thought I'd like because it dealt with both Australia, and a smart, feisty woman. The book is The Road From Coorain, a memoir by Jill Ker Conway. And, heavens, after all this time, I finally finished it tonight.

Conway is an Australian-American, who was the first female President of Smith College. As a women's college graduate,

myself (from one who has never had a female President, I may add. Ehem, alma mater, I'm looking at you...), this resume credential grabbed my attention. I'm always intrigued by people who dedicate their careers to the education of women.

I will admit that it took me so long to read the book because I did find the writing to be a bit dense, so I'd read a few pages a time, and then put it down ... read another book ... and pick it back up for awhile. I'm glad I finally made it through, though, because it is an inspiring life's journey, and one that sheds light on Australian culture, as it was in the mid-Century, the remnants of which I'd dare say remain evident.

Conway grew up on a sheep farm in the western part of New South Wales (the same state that Sydney is in, but climatically more like the "red center" than the lush, beachy coastal areas I tend to feature here). Her description of her childhood is of one with very little to do with being a child, and nearly everything to do with growing up as a farm worker, who was herding sheep long before she reached double digits in age. She also had to maneuver the emotional landscape of her parents, who were wholly in over their heads with their homestead. Her description of living through a dust storm made me feel as if I had grit in my teeth, and the torture of living through several years of drought seemed indescribably emotionally draining. In fact, her life changed after the death of her father, which she suggests may have been a suicide, though it was officially ruled accidental. After incurring debt and finding himself beyond his means to keep the farm afloat, with no hope of a rainy season, perhaps he simply resigned himself in the only way he could think to, in the age before one might just declare bankruptcy (her parents had much too much pride to ever just walk away, even if it were an option) or even consider the possibility of much in the way of social support.

She and her mother put the farm in the hands of a caretaker, and moved to Sydney, where she enrolled in school for the first time. While facing a good deal of continuing family hardship, she thrived as a student, eventually earning a degree in history from the University of New South Wales. One very interesting observation is that the students were made to study all things British, at that time. There was very little concept of Australian identity or history, but rather a desire to follow the customs and history of the Mother Land.

From her graduation, her story becomes a frustrating study in both the role of women, at the time, as well as the entrenched establishment morays in Australian academia. She's denied work because she's "too attractive" and will probably have children soon. She very much wants to study Australian history, in a way that makes sense to her, but finds no pathway to do so. She is able to study government documents, accounts of the First Fleet, and so forth; but given her upbringing so attached to the land, she wants to piece together a more human account of the development of Australian culture. Eventually, she cuts ties with the country, in order to study American history, which she believes will lead her to understand how to better understand Australian culture. The book leaves off with her departure from Australian soil, an act that she seems to deem both sad and necessary.

This book gave me an appreciation for the character of the homesteaders who made their living in the brutal conditions of areas in Australia like the town Conway grew up. I wonder what makes someone fight odds so steep. Perhaps you come to love the land, on its terms, for all of its difficult personality traits, and maybe there's a payoff there in the successful years. It must be more than monetary, but something much deeper, to drive people to such a hard-scrabble and lonely existence.

I Googled "Coorain," and came up with only one photo. It is a picture of the farm today, that accompanied an article about how drought was threatening to put it out of business. So many years later, and there are still folks compelled to fight all the odds ... This gave me a sense of what life there must have been like ... dry, hot, gritty, and dusty.

The memoir also presents a study of the way in which our experiences with one culture make us see a new culture with a unique eye, which someone who grew up in the society could never see. That outsider's perspective is both a blessing and a curse ... perhaps it is sometimes easier to not know so much ...

In any case, at many points in her life, Conway could have chosen to take a much easier path, that might have led to a nice, sensible life. Instead, she continually chose to take the path of greater resistance, but richer rewards. What a marvelous life she carved out for herself. She clearly owes it as equally to her great intellect as to that homestead spirit that so bewilders me.