#AusReadingMonth2022 Voss

 

Author:   Patrick White   (1912 – 1990)
Title:   Voss  
Published: 1957
Trivia: In 1973 White accepted the Nobel Prize
for an epic and psychological narrative art…
which has introduced a new continent into literature.

 

ANALYSIS:

1. Explain the title. In what way is it suitable to the story? The name of the main character: Johan Ulrich Voss

2. What is the predominant element in the story?  Character: We see how Voss and Laura  will change in the book.

3. Who is the single main character about?  Johan Voss:  Laura is also seen as a main character.

4. How does the author handle characterization?

White lets the other characters describe Voss….
Le Mesurier: ‘greedy looking pig, German swine (ch 2)
Topp (represents White’s mentor Roy de Maitre):
“great men are exempt from trivial duties… […]
if the German was not great, Topp would have liked him to be” (ch 2)
Brother Muller: “Mr Voss, you have a contempt for God
…because He is not in your own image.” (ch 2)
Narrator: ‘Voss and Laura, they shared some guilty secret of personality.
Only, nobody noticed.”  (makes the reader very curious….) (ch 3)
Mrs. Sanderson – Voss is troubled in some way “…needs to be saved” (ch 6)
The expedition reveals the characters of the the men involved.
A group of people whose characters and
…relationships are fixed are placed in new circumstances
The men are forced to adjust.
Some thrive and survive (Judd) …others are destroyed and  never return.
The way the characters either grow and change or
….deepen reveal elements of themselves.
Team: Harry Robarts, Mr. Turner, Frank Le Mesurier,
…Ralph Angus, Judd, Mr Palfreyman and Voss.

 

5. What sort of conflict confronts the leading character or characters?

• External – Voss has contempt for God. He even feels he is better than God.
• Internal – Voss must be humbled. He must learn he is not God…only then will he be nearest to becoming so.

 

6.  How is the conflict resolved?
There must be a sacrifice so that sins can be forgiven, redemption.
Laura knows either she or Voss must die.
She is prepared to do it when she becomes ill (ch 13).
She will lose her daughter and Voss forever.
Through the ‘mystical telepathy’ that Voss and Laura share…she knows he has been killed.
She regains her strength….and lives, but Voss is always with her.

7. Who tells the story?  3rd person narrator

8. What is the general theme of the story?
Self-discovery — suffering — mystical experience — redemption
“..country develops ‘out of the suffering of the humble.”
“…true knowledge only comes ‘of death by torture in the country of the mind.”

9. Where does the primary action take place?
Sydney
journey to Newcastle by ship
Rhine Towers  (Mr. Sanderson’s home; represents the romantic Germany)
…into the desert country….into hell.

10. What is the timeline? The book begins when Laura is 20 and  ends when she is 45 yrs. ( 25 yrs)

 

11. How does the story get started,  initial incident?
Johann Ulrich Voss, a German immigrant, calls on Edmund Bonner,
…the major financial backer of the expedition.
Voss meets Bonner’s niece Laura Trevelyen.
The development of their ensuing relationship  parallels the fate of the expedition.

 

12. Briefly describe the rising action:
Laura and Voss meet in a garden.
There they experience a ‘mystical’ moment  when their souls bonded.
Laura sees Voss’s pride as a dangerous thing.
She will pray for him even is she has to teach herself to pray.
” Then he was touching her, his hand was upon her shoulderblades,
…and they realized they had returned into their bodies.” (ch 4)

 

13. What is the high point, or climax, of the story?
Voss sees himself as a god-like figure.
White uses many words in the narrative to emphasize this:
eminence, sovereign, superior “he stares imperiously over the heads of men” (ch 6)
Irony: the aboriginals  see him NOT as a god but as an alien (foreigner)
….that must be destroyed.

 

14. Discuss the falling action or close of the story.
Chapter 16 is the best section.
Laura is now a schoolmistress and her adopted daughter Mercy still with her.
Judd, a member of expedition presumed lost, has appeared.
Colonel Hebden, who is determined to find the
…remains of the expedition wants to talk with Laura.
She is reluctant…but finally reveals new insights.

 

15. Does this story create any special mood?
The mood is mystical with all the extensive religious symbolism.
Voss is compared repeatedly to God, Christ and the Devil.
Like Christ Voss  goes into the desert.

16. Is this story realistic or true to life?
It is based upon the life of the 19th C Prussian explorer / naturalist Ludwig Leichhardt.
He disappeared while on an expedition into the Australian outback 1848.

17. What is the structure of the book? Ch 1-4        introduction to characters with back round information Ch 5 – 11:   expedition with alternating chapters taking the reader back to Laura on Sydney Ch 12 – 13: parallel each other – last days of Voss in desert – sudden sickness of Laura in Sydney Ch 14-16:   25 years after the  Voss’s expedition

 

18. Did you identify with any of the characters?
Laura: in chapter 1 she looks inward.
She was absorbed in the depths of her own predicament.
In chapter 6 she is a humble, kind woman who loves outcasts:
the ‘strange man’ (Voss) and the adopted daughter (Mercy) (ch 9)
…for whom she cared for after the child’s mother had  died.
She now looks outward …to others.
She will not be brushed to the sidelines
because others think her plain, ugly a little freakish in her black dresses.
” No, I will not go. I am here. I will stay. Thus she made her covenant”. (ch 16)
…her divine promise establishing God’s relationship to humanity.

 

19. Can you find any examples of figurative language? (ch 8)
White can go overboard with the ‘poetic style’...example:
Valley = bride;  sun = bridegroom;  joined in = liquid gold of complete union
White can be so so original…example:
– pelicans, making off on wings of creaking basket-work
– creases in his black trousers appeared to have been sculpted for eternity
White can be a word virtuoso…example:
“Blank faces (members team) like so many paper kites
…dangling a vertebral tail, could prevent him (Voss) soaring
towards the apotheosis (god-like state) for which he was reserved.”

 

20. Does this story contain any of the following elements?

Foreshadowing:

Voss hopes to be absorbed by the land ( conversation at the Sanderson’s home)
This is a terrible foreshadowing.
…but the reader has no idea what it relates to.
The ‘ah-ha’ moment will come at the end of the story. (ch 2)

Symbols:
Mirror  =  reflects the true self
Laura gazes in the mirror to see her deformities
Voss gazes in the mirror to see his importance (god-like figure,) (ch 4)
Desert = represents Voss
Laura describes Voss  ‘vast and ugly’; ‘with rocks of prejudice’; a person ‘isolated’
She is fascinated by him: “You are my desert.” (ch 4)

Biblical allusion:
Voss asks Judd to kill a lamb for the Christmas celebration in the camp
Foreshadowing: sacrifice of a lamb in the OT was a symbol to
…the complete and perfect sacrifice of Jesus Christ.
(Hebrews 9:22) “…without shedding of blood there will be no forgiveness (redemption).
This is symbolic because Voss, who sees himself as a Christ-figure,
will at the end submit to the aboriginals, be humbled and also sacrificed.
His blood will be absorbed by the earth.
He will be finally redeemed. (ch 8)

 

Names of characters: (…clever…)
Mr Plumpton  – was thin, scrawny and always hungry
Mrs. Child –  was…’the midwife’
Mr. Palfreyman – member of expedition, name reminds one of medieval quests

 

Simile:
Brendan Boyle… was like the big, rude, red potatoes, the shapely ones,
but hard with the fine red dust coating them” (ch 8)

 

Metaphor:  (…strange…)
Voss’s expedition is compared to
“like being worm…butting my head at whatsoever darkness of the earth” (ch 2)

 

Irony:
The farther Voss and Laura are separated from each other physically ( Sydney – the desert)
…the closer they become spiritually.
“…(I) include my love, since distance has united us thus closely.” (ch 8)

 

21. Does the story contain a single effect or impression for the reader?
The book left me with one effect….exhaustion.
Patrick White is very poetic, verbose (descriptions) and
….allusions representing complex ideas and emotions.
At times it was hard to keep up with…his genius.
In chapters 10-13 White mingles Voss’s thoughts
….about Laura with the narrative without warning.
Voss sees her with him ….there in the desert.
This was at times very confusing.

 

22: What were the sentences that impressed you the most?   Laura: quotations (ch 4)
Laura’s  realization that she is beset by dark helplessness
…that might become obsessions:
” If I am lost, than who can be saved…”
Laura told Voss what she thought about him:
” Everyone is offended by the truth and you will not be an exception”. (ouch!)

Voss:  quotation (ch 8)
” Life starts fresh with every new journey…even into the dust.”
After I finished the book I realized the foreshadowing implied
Voss’s blood will be absorbed  by the dust (execution).
The beginning of his new journey will start….his redemption.

 

Conclusion:
I could not put this book down.
It cast a spell
…but not always in the good way.

The chapters paralleling the relationship between Laura and Voss
with the fate of the  expedition were very good.
The descriptions of secondary characters,
The Bonners, Belle,  maid Rose, The Pringles was Dickensian.
We read details of houses, interiors, ball gowns, parties and picnics.
White paints a picture of jollity and conviviality
..that are a stark contrast to the chapters describing the expedition.
These sections were at times gruesome.
I read a summary of the book before reading.
I was afraid Patrick White would otherwise overwhelm me.
He is an author that can be intimidating.
Pre-warned about the eventual fate of Voss,
…I was able to identify many moments of ‘foreshadowing’.

 

Last thoughts:
Warning: Ch 10 ends with Voss finally reading Frank Le Mesurier’s  secret journal.
The journal contains poems.
Remember all these strange poems  =  the voice of Patrick White!
Beyond strange…
I am impressed by Patrick White’s  writing.
He deservedly received the Nobel Prize 1973.
  Patrick White: (1912 – 1990)