The Slow Natives

by Thea Astley

The winner of Australia's prize for lifetime achievement in literature chronicles one family's unraveling and their tentative rapprochement forged through tragedy. "Sheer pleasure," is how Newsday described Thea Astley's most recent book, Vanishing Points. Now, with The Slow Natives, Astley's wit, sense of irony, and ability to delineate human foibles link her to such great observers of the human comedy as Graham Greene and Iris Murdoch. The Slow Natives takes place on that familiar battleground where middle age and adolescence confront each other, in a climate of hostile bewilderment, contempt, and reluctant love. At its center are music teacher Bernard Leverson, bored with his job and his marriage; his wife, Iris, who is engaged listlessly in an affair; and their rebellious teenage son, Keith. Their path leads inevitably to tragedy, but also presses the Leversons toward a reappreciation of their lives and one another. Here is a novel that confirms Thea Astley as one of the best writers of our time.

Genres: Australia, Fiction, Novels, 20th Century

Hardcover

First published January 1, 1965

About the author

Thea Astley was one of Australia's most respected and acclaimed novelists. Born in Brisbane in 1925, Astley studied arts at the University of Queensland. She held a position as Fellow in Australian Literature at Macquarie University until 1980, when she retired to write full time. In 1989 she was granted an honorary doctorate of letters from the University of Queensland.

She won the Miles Franklin Award four times - in 1962 for The Well Dressed Explorer, in 1965 for The Slow Natives, in 1972 for The Acolyte and in 2000 for Drylands. In 1989 she was award the Patrick White Award. Other awards include 1975 The Age Book of the Year Award for A Kindness Cup, the 1980 James Cook Foundation of Australian Literature Studies Award for Hunting the Wild Pineapple, the 1986 ALS Gold Medal for Beachmasters, the 1988 Steele Rudd Award for It's Raining in Mango, the 1990 NSW Premier's Prize for Reaching Tin River, and the 1996 Age Book of the Year Award and the FAW Australian Unity Award for The Multiple Effects of Rainshadow.

Praise for Thea Astley:

'Beyond all the satire, the wit, the occasional cruelty, and the constant compassion, the unfailing attribute of Astley's work is panache' Australian Book Review

Reviews

[zed · Rating 4 out of 5]

Being a native (slow one?) of Brisbane, the main setting for this Miles Franklin winner, I found my self intrigued. The story itself is a very well written tale of a dysfunctional family and the consequences of that dysfunction. The parents Bernard, Iris and their son Keith were characterised beautifully by the author from the very start. This led me, the reader, to know them intimately and understand why they were what they were. The same could be said for every other protagonist that appeared. A sad spinster hating her past, a questioning priest feeling lost with his beliefs, authoritarian Monsignor and Mother Superior who lorded it over their flock made up further memorable characters. My favourite was Chookie, a young man from the decidedly lower end of the socio economic scale who pushed my memory to remind me of a character who I went to school with. He spoke the same, was the same red-headed complexion and was the epitome of what we school mates thought of as a bit of a larrikin.

My intrigue in itself was the use of language among the middle class families that played large part of the story. Did Brisbaneites of this social standing talk in this manner in the very early 60's? The language of the book for long periods is hardly strine. Brisbane was very much a big country town and stayed that way until well into the early 80's. The liberalism and education of the family groups that frequented this book seems to me to be, at the very least, the early stirrings of a change from the insularity that was then to what Brisbane is today, a cosmopolitan city of 2 million people that is not that far removed in attitude from anywhere else on the planet.

And that is why I suspect this was a winner of the Miles Franklin at the time. It covered themes that may not have been considered "normal" in Brisbane. A place behind the times. Even Bernard, with his middle class chat and liberal attitude towards his wife's peccadilloes was a music teacher assessing Bach. No Beatles for this middle class patriarch.

Very much recommended to those with an interest in Australian Literature.

[Michael Livingston · Rating 3 out of 5]

Astley is a wonderful writer whose language is always surprising and vivid, but this novel didn't quite hit me like the others I've read recently. It's a fairly brutal attack on middle class Brisbane life in the mid 60s, as the social upheaval of the period hits. Things get a bit melodramatic, and the coincidental connections between the characters don't always feel natural, but on a sentence-by-sentence level Astley is still excellent value.

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I do love a book that’s as rich and complex as Thea Astley’s The Slow Natives. Her characterisation can be simply devastating:


Bernard had met Miss Trumper before. Six times? Seven? He was not sure, but she could have given him a total of minutes devastatingly accurate, a summation of trade, an analysis (false) of looks exchanged or emphases (misread). Her frantic hands automatically began to twitch curls into provocative positions and one forefinger, desperate digit, rubbed the corner of her mouth to erase the trapped carmine grease she knew from experience would be there. Then one hand stroked pleats, and then pushed at puffs of hair at her nape. Her hair-style had not changed since she wowed them during the war. And she went, naked as birth, across the concrete veranda to the man who had never yet really seen her.

‘Hullo’, said hearty Bernard, all pipe and chuckles. ‘What splendid weather for lotus-eating! And how are you?’ (p.95)

In The Slow Natives, her fourth novel and the second of four to win the Miles Franklin Award, Astley is writing about an era of social change where not everyone has caught the bus. It is the middle sixties, and in the fictional town of Condamine the role of women is still circumscribed even though the sexual revolution is stirring. Astley’s post-menopausal married women are just that, and only that, and her unmarried women like Miss Trumper are oddities. It is men who have agency…

And it is men who dominate the narrative voice. The story begins with Bernard Leverson and his travails at a wearisome slide night. (Remember slide nights, anyone? Such torture!) Bernard has a wife, Iris, who is having a tepid affair with Gerald Seabrook, which is a matter of indifference to Bernard but not to his son Keith. Keith is adrift in the stormy waters of adolescence, and spends his judgemental time baiting his parents. Through his eyes we see the damage done to the young by adult betrayals and indifference; through his father’s eyes we see the banality of a long marriage and an insipid career.

The characterisation of women in this novel is quite striking when one remembers Astley’s feminism.

To read the rest of my review please visit http://anzlitlovers.com/2015/09/13/th...

[Jayden McComiskie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is now one of my favourite Australian novels.

[Nancy · Rating 5 out of 5]

by Thea Astley

Author: Thea Astley (1925-2004)
Title: The Slow Natives
Published: 1965
Genre: social satire
Setting: Condamine (Queensland Australia)
Tone: empathetic as Astely examines the lives…so recognizable to her
Publication success: this book won the Miles Franklin Award 1965 and
gained Astely her well-deserved audience in the U.S.
It was her to be her breakthrough…novel.

Title:

I choose the image of a family of elephants to represent
the central characters, the Leversons, in this book.
…Bernard, Iris and their son Keith.
Astely revealed how she came across the title of the book.
It is based on a joke she heard:
What’s the black stuff between the elephant’s toes?
Slow natives. (pg 160, Thea Astley: Inventing Her Own Weather)

Plot:

A suburban couple, Iris and Bernard,
…have drifted into the shallows of middle-aged boredom.
Their fourteen-year-old son, Keith is a stranger.
The boy slips into petty theft…shoplifting.
This is a portrait of the surface of ordinary life
…but underneath emotions are rising.
Astley alternates chapters about Iris, Bernard and Keith with
…Father Lingard and Sister Matthew.
They are doubting their religious vocations.
…Miss Trumper and Miss Paradise .
Spinsters now in their fifties…life has passed them by.

Book and Astley’s life:

Astley has used many aspects of
her family, unstable marriage and life-long struggle with Catholicism.
Sister Matthew – psychologically unhinged nun – Astley’s Catholic convent education
If you have ever been taught by those self-effacing Catholic nuns
you will appreciate Astley’s imagery.
This brings back memories:
Favorite Quote: (Sister Matthew with pupil Eva)
“… gently touching her arm with a force that was not at all physical,
but held the compulsion that brings mountains to Mahomet.” (pg 52)

Father Lingard – sexually starved spinster priest = Astley’s brother Phil who was a priest
Astley felt the church was stealing his time….stealing his life.
The Leversons are based on her own family = husband Jack and son Ed
Bernard Leverson is a piano teacher = based on Astely’s music teacher A. Sharman
Keith Leverson – Astley’s rebellious son = Ed
Iris Leverson = Thea Astley’s own self-absorbed personality

Characters:

Keith: desperate need for a father’s firm hand
Bernard: finally becomes emotionally engaged with son
…while the boy is unconscious in hospital….he is almost too late.
Iris: ‘one-liner’s, her smart-arsed cracks
…relieved the tension in the marriage…but not for long.
Poor Iris….her adultery had not been a success.
Husband Bernard did not care and the other one (Gerald) was not tortured.
Favorite quote:
“Let someone, anyone, love me, she prayed, burning the toast.”
Thea Astley is in top-form ….social satire about Condamine Australia!

Conclusion:

I did not think Astley’s writing could get any better.
It does!
After reading Girl With a Monkey (1958), Descant for Gossips (1960)
and The Well Dressed Explorer (1962)
…this is the best book so far!
It won the Miles Franklin Award 1965.
Astely was asked what is the most difficult part of writing?
She said writing dialogue that does not sound trivial.
This book is filled with clever… eggshell brittle dialogue
…with dazzling metaphors, dense prose.
Strong point: Astley’s skill in constructing the perfect image with
an action verb that ties it all up into a neat powerful package!
Example: …lollipop umbrella’s had their color sucked from them by the sun.
Example: …along the drooping eyelids the blood pulsed lavender.
This is a gem!

[Kris McCracken · Rating 1 out of 5]

Sorry Thea, I quit this one about a third of the way through. This is a rare thing for me, but I found the trials and tribulations of this dull middle class Brisbane suburbanites unbearable. On top of that, the whole subplot of priests and nuns is just...

Christ, it bores me now even thinking about it!

[Pat · Rating 4 out of 5]

The focus of this 1965 novel is the Leverson family, father Bernard, a music teacher, in a tired marriage with Iris both struggling to parent a rebellious 14-year old son Keith. Their lives are ordinary, even humdrum. They live in a suburb of Brisbane, Australia and the reader’s first impression may well be that there is not enough drama to make a plot. However Astley’s novel deftly reveals the drama that is family life, the struggle to connect, to express love to a son who has gone from the “pink, warm, wet” infant to a ” whining, arrogating” teenager, the failure to nurture a marriage whose early glow has failed to develop into a mature love.
Astley uses a shifting point of view to explore and express the gaps in communication that can create a void in the midst of a family. First we see the parents from Keith’s point of view. He sees them clearly but through the harsh lens of a teenager who can’t imagine ever declining physically or not making some great mark on the world. Iris reflects on her husband’s comment that ”after twenty years of marriage you feel as if you are the same sex” and decides to have an affair choosing rather surprised Gerald Seabrook, a member of their social circle. Bernard finds out eventually and feels “sad for Gerald and tinnily amused” his only concern being that Keith should not find out and be hurt. For her part, once the affair is discovered, Iris’s strongest emotion is anger that her husband doesn’t seem to care. For his part Gerald knows his part is “to say that Bernard failed to appreciate her, and to comfort and fertilize the sparse vine that trailed all over his days, hungry tendrils finding him in the office, sneaking into domestic crevices…and hope to God his own wife did not know.”
Astley’s characters are well drawn. We are shown them as they see themselves and from the points of view of the other characters. This approach reveals the asymmetry of relationships that create the miscommunications and misunderstandings that are a natural part of life. Her descriptions are rich in humor even as they are direct. Dr. Leo Varga, who puts forward an intellectual persona at social gatherings with the Leverson’s suburban circle but puts on a different cool surfer pose at his beach home. “Although he was ugly within reason, his belief in his fascination was an article of faith, a dogma pronounced ex cathedra, despite, or because of the fleshy nose , scrubbing brush beard and brilliant eyes that he could use masterfully, nailing his victim with a charm dart.”
The priest Father Lambert is both Bernard Leverson’s confessor and his partner in burying his pain in drink. The various convents where Bernard goes to examine and grade music students are where he gets status, but a confrontation with a piano student who is also a nun opens his eyes to the fact that while he has the power to assess whether students, including the nun, have made the grade he also has power to wound through the lack of empathy with which he does this.
By the point in the novel that Keith’s clandestine mini-forays into the larger world turn into a real and in the end calamitous road trip Astley has deftly contrasted teenage Keith’s struggle for identity with the shells the adults have built around themselves in self-protection, shells which make it hard to reach out to each other for fear of exposing their fears, shells whose rigidity has closed off their ability to develop mature relationships.
The writing is brilliant. For much of the book it seems so little is happening but in fact Astley is creating a complex and believable picture of the nuances of human relationships that is very recognizable to all of us who struggle daily with the challenges of understanding those we love and live with and being understood by them. The description of Chookie Mumberson, who becomes Keith’s partner in crime takes only a few lines to delineate his background and place in the world. “Behind the polka dot freckles bumpy moldings of his short-nosed face with its light blue eyes can be observed without much pleasure. Only a mother could – and she never did.” Keith is described as being “somber as lye” when he is silenced at one point by his father. At the point where Bernard realizes from Keith’s white face that he know about his mother’s affair “Love fell, just for a few seconds, a wild and unexpected rain, with memories of bath-times, animal-shaped cakes of soap, red-faced tantrums and small fierce fingers curling about his own.”
Adtley uses humor to great effect to create the social setting. Mrs. Coady “worshipfully fed another culture biscuit into the projector” at the same time as she is “tortured also by tight shoes and falsifying undergarments.” It’s funny but also acute. For my generation the travel sideshow given by my parent’s better off friends was a particular misery.
Thea Astley won the 1965 Miles Franklin prize for this book, Australia’s highest literary honor given to “the novel for the year which is of the highest literary merit and which must present Australian Life in any of its phases”. I would say that this masterful book is not limited by its Australian setting but has universal relevance.

[Sammy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Despite having won a record four Miles Franklins, it is easy to forget how fantastic a writer Thea Astley was. Perhaps this is because it is her later (and, frankly, weaker) work that is more available in second-hand bookstores. Perhaps it's the usual tired cultural-cringe narrative still running through my generation's veins. It certainly can't be because her themes or attitude are dated. Her tales of vaguely unlikable, repressed, judgmental Australians still resonate. Her characters glancing at one another, never looking in the same place at the same time, rarely able to express how they feel, usually unaware of the missed connections. Worrying their teeth along the frayed edges of their cultural norms, unsettled by the new, but unsatisfied with the old.

Astley strikes me as Australia's answer to Muriel Spark, or Margaret Drabble. They too are authors who can seem a bit "dried up" to my generation but - once the book has begun - surprise us with their savagery and insight. And unlike most of Australia's great writers born before 1940 (Patrick White and Christina Stead come to mind), she was truly Australian from birth to death.

The Slow Natives haunts me, and I'm not even sure it's one of her best books. It is, nevertheless, a riveting portrait of the grayness of life and the chances some take to grab at flecks of colour therein - or, more often, the way ordinary people remain blind to those polychromatic moments. Is Astley cruel? Many readers think so. I instead see her as honest, reflecting a guarded, territorial, tall-poppy-obsessed 1960s Australia. I hope our culture has changed in 60 years. I think it has. But, then again, no-one in Astley's fiction seems too far removed from our reality.

[SWC · Rating 5 out of 5]

News about the Miles Franklin Award drew my curiosity to books and authors who had previously won the Award. I note that the author is recorded as having won the Award on four occasions. So the next time I visited my local library I went looking. I was intrigued to find this title in the ‘Classics’ section. Living near Brisbane I did appreciate that the story took place generally in or near Brisbane. I find that when I enjoy a book that there are often details which are not necessarily important for the development of the plot. Those details, though, enhance the setting in the plot has developed. And that was what I found as the plot developed. The concluding few pages especially maintained my attention.

[Ed Parke · Rating 4 out of 5]

"My dear, you are so very young." Sister Beatrice patted her arm kindly. "That is the greatest and most terrible loneliness of all."

Another ripper from Ms Astley. I agree with other reviewers that the centrality of eccentric/educated characters in 1960's Brisbane seemed a bit incongruous (& no offence to my beloved River City). However, it reminds one that still (brown) waters can run deep. Particularly fascinating to consider the inner lives of precocious teenagers and country clerics in mid-century Australia. This fantastic novel would be of interest to anyone with a psychoanalytic or mystic bent, and anyone who has read and enjoyed the likes of Graham Greene, J. F. Powers, or Shirley Hazzard.

[Anthea Carta · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can see why this book won the Miles Franklin award in 1965, because the writing is superb. The title of the book made me a little afraid to read this in 2021, and if it was released now I’d suggest it wouldn’t have this title, but there was nothing in it that suggested racism. The story is one that many in middle age could relate to, and it was very engaging.