A tale that doesn't carry a pinch of meaning, but if you dig in, you can see the transformation of a single character's worldview...but that's not certain.
Pseudonym of Donald Gordon Payne. Donald Gordon Payne was an English author of adventure novels and travel books. Donald Gordon Payne was born in Denmark Hill in South East London in January 1924. His father, Francis, was a New Zealander, who served in the First World War with the ANZACS. His mother was Evelyn Rodgers, a nurse during the Great War. He was educated at Dulwich College Preparatory School and then at Charterhouse School. As a child he travelled with his parents to New Zealand and parts of the East coast of Australia – an experience which left him with a lifelong affection for these countries.
A small airplane is flying to the south of Australia. On board the plane are a brother and sister, who are waiting to meet their grandmother, to whom they are going on vacation. (although they may not be in anything like that, and this is all my speculation), but the plane crashed on the edge of a huge desert. That's a bit of a mystery, isn't it? This story is devoid of any additional details concerning the plane crash. In fact, it may be unnecessary, because the author has focused all the attention of his Reader on a completely different subject.
The children who have come to their senses (alive) meet an aboriginal boy on their way. And this directly became a decisive event for them. Rather not even for THEM, but for HER. What's her name? Mamie? Well, it doesn't really matter what her name is. What matters is this.
It's another book that deals with the subject of race. It's like a bottomless pit. So, questions about what anyone's name is, who went where, and more importantly, whether they came at all. As well as why the plane fell, how it fell and where the corpse of their uncle (with whom they were flying) becomes completely unimportant. About the corpse of the uncle, I, of course, overreacted, after all it is not a horror movie I'm reading...there were not even crocodiles. The only animal I met here was a baby kangaroo, and that in a dead state, caught for food. In general, frankly speaking, I was terribly annoyed by the attitude of a white 12-year-old girl to the fact that the boy they met (a symbol of saving their lives, if you will), imagine, a Negro. Ah, what a horror! What a disgusting misunderstanding! Of course, because "naked nigger" is a stiff insult to a white girl's eyes. As Peter said, "Girls are so stupid, they've got it all wrong." - and that's where I agree with her little brother.
Her brother, who's a little bit younger, is still free of the white man's racial prejudice. Peter doesn't have doubts, he's hungry, yes! He realizes they need help! To hell with skin color and social status! Does he have any weight where survival rules?! No, sir.
At first, the girl seems a little too mature for me, but that's just for the time being. Oh, she's got the sugar thing down pat, donating it to her brother. But when it comes time to make a decision about survival, all the hubris wears off. And you can see the contrived adulthood disappear, revealing a childish immaturity underneath. In addition to racial prejudice, the author loads gender issues into his infernal machine and the drum spins and spins, mixing everything into one diverse hodgepodge. The author also demonstrates the differences between the two cultures and through the girl's stereotypical thinking, which clearly took precedence over natural awareness (which annoyed even more). The more socialized a person is in society, the more wild they are in the context of nature. It's as if the characters are ranked on a scale of "adequacy". The girl is at the lowest level, for all her piety. The brother clearly represents a transitional stage from civilization to natural naturalness and, finally, the aboriginal boy appears to us as a hero living in maximum harmony with nature.
The most curious thing is the way the author describes the perception of what is happening and the thoughts of the Aboriginal boy himself! This is who epitomizes true humanity! Seeing before him people radically different from himself, the aboriginal boy evaluates their ability to survive (for there is no more important criterion in the desert) and draws the appropriate conclusions. And he helps them as best he can. Perhaps this is the only character I really liked. He has mental strength, masculinity, honesty, openness. Kindness. Heck, he even has the tact, on an intuitive level, to behave that way: "He didn't get close to the girl, guessing he was scaring her with something. He slowly laid down on the ground on the other side of the fire."
Of course, there is something described (in passing) about the nomadic life of the Aborigines, which creates a kind of depressing picture, but I can't say that some purely Australian atmosphere was created.
You can get «Walkabout» at Amazon
This article was sponsored by Olga Prolagayeva
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