Velvet Waters

by Gerald Murnane

When the Mice Failed to Arrive
Stream System
Land Deal
The Only Adam
Stone Quarry
Precious Bane
Cotters Come No More
There Were Some Countries
Finger-Web
First Love
Velvet Waters

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction

235 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1990

About the author

Murnane's first two books, Tamarisk Row (1974) and A Lifetime on Clouds (1976), seem to be semi-autobiographical accounts of his childhood and adolescence. Both are composed largely of very long but grammatical sentences.

In 1982, he attained his mature style with The Plains, a short novel about a young filmmaker who travels to a fictive country far within Australia, where his failure to make a film is perhaps his most profound achievement. The novel is both a metaphysical parable about appearance and reality, and a parodic examination of traditions and cultural horizons. The novel depicts an abstracted Australia, akin to something out of mythology or fable. The novel was followed by: Landscape With Landscape (1985), Inland (1988), Velvet Waters (1990), and Emerald Blue (1995). A book of essays, Invisible Yet Enduring Lilacs, appeared in 2005, and a new work of fiction, Barley Patch, was released in 2009. All of these books are concerned with the relation between memory, image, and landscape, and frequently with the relation between fiction and non-fiction.

Murnane is mainly known within Australia. A seminar was held on his work at the University of Newcastle in 2001. Murnane does, however, also have a following in other countries, especially Sweden and the United States, where The Plains was published in 1985 and reprinted in 2004 (New Issues Poetry & Prose), and where Dalkey Archive Press has recently issued Barley Patch and will be reprinting Inland in 2012. In 2011, The Plains' was translated into French and published in France by P.O.L, and in 2012 will be published in Hungarian. In July/August 2017, The Plains was the number 1 book recommendation of South West German Radio (SWR2). His works have been translated into Italian (Velvet Waters as Una Melodia), German (The Plains as Die Ebenen, Border Districts as Grenzbezirke, Landscape With Landscape as Landschaft mit Landschaft, all publ. Suhrkamp Verlag), Spanish (The Plains as Las llanuras, and Something for the Pain as Una vida en las carreras, all published by Editorial Minúscula), Catalan (The Plains as Les planes, also published by Editorial Minúscula), Swedish (Inland as Inlandet, The Plains as Slätterna, Velvet Waters as Sammetsvatten and Barley Patch as Korntäppa) and Serbian (The Plains as Ravnice; Inland as Unutrašnjost, both published by Blum izdavaštvo 2025).

Reviews

[Justin Evans · Rating 4 out of 5]

This one was best when Murnane did things that he doesn't normally do in his novels; the Kafkaesque stuff was fun, for instance. The title piece, on the other hand, seemed more like a failed novel than a good story, and I'm pretty sure that some of the other pieces were literally parts of a failed novel. Of course, any Murnane is worth reading, for the sentences alone.

[John Macgregor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Takes an expert hammer to that middle-brow fiction we call reality.

Leaves the post-modernists who can streaming in his wake...in his wake.

I normally dislike tricks with chronology & point-of-view, but this one's irresistible.

Hypnotic.

[Liam · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't say I have any particular interest in maps, place names, cardinal directions, nor the topography of Melbourne and its surrounding suburbs and grasslands, all of which play key roles in many of the stories in Velvet Waters, but Murnane seems the type who can turn anything into a comic, web-like, intriguing story. His stories also frequently involve stories about himself and writing of fiction, often from the viewpoint in the present where he reminisces about memories from the past where he had an eye towards the future. When writing of his childhood Murnane comes off as a precocious, innocent, charming wee lad, whereas when he writes of his adulthood he comes off as a precocious, innocent, charming old writer.

His writing style is repetitive and excessively grammatical, in a way that I'm guessing won't be everyone's pint of beer, but to some like myself, his prose combined with his idiosyncratic imagination and storytelling abilities make for an irresistible creation. I greatly look forward to finishing the rest of this book soon, as well as to give his novels a read.

[Ripleyland · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ehhhh, it’s alright. Definitely not a good as most of his stuff.

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author of this story lives in the same state but not the same place as the writer of this review. He seems however to live in a different time, perhaps in the time of the mother of the writer of this review. The man mentioned first in the first sentence of this review has produced an intricate study of memory, place and time. The delicate reminiscence of St Kilda, Lorne, Hepburn Springs and the foundation suburbs of southern Melbourne will shimmer in the mind of the writer of this review. The author of ‘Velvet Waters’ is not for everyone but the writer of this review was prepared to allow the story to unfold in its meticulous way and has been rewarded for it. Others should do the same.

[David Karlsson]

Efter att ha läst "Slätterna" för nån månad sen kände jag mig egentligen rätt mätt på Murnane och tänkte att det nog skulle ta ett tag innan jag återbesökte honom. Så blev det uppenbarligen inte...

Den här novellsamlingen ska enligt baksidestexten ha "självbiografisk fond" och skiljer sig en del från "Slätterna" genom att berättelserna är mer jordnära och alldagliga. Istället är det i språket som mycket händer; det är upprepningar, omskrivningar och referenser till det egna skrivandet och till läsaren. När det fungerar som bäst blir det bra, i andra fall inte lika intressant. Bäst gillade jag den längre titelnovellen samt "Stenbrottet" som handlar om en författarverkstad där deltagarna inte tillåts ha någon kontakt med varandra annat än genom den skönlitteratur de producerar (och som sedan ska brännas upp innan de åker hem).

"Slätterna" slutade det med att jag läste två gånger på rad. Jag tror att flera av novellerna här också skulle vinna på att läsas igen, men det får i så fall bli någon annan gång för riktigt lika fascinerad blev jag inte av denna.

(Tidigare publicerad på Instagram utan betyg, sätter därför inget såhär i efterhand.)

[Mina Widding · Rating 2 out of 5]

Alltså, jag tycker att det är intressant hur han arbetar med formen, men resultatet och innehållet var bara så... tråkigt. Ett staplande av mer eller mindre mondän information om en tråkig ungkarls och eller gift mans rätt tråkiga liv, förlåt Murnane, förstår att detta är mer eller mindre självbiografiskt, men det hjälper ju inte. Det finns upprepningar och vardagliga detaljer här liksom i Fosses prosa, men hos Fosse är det liksom ett trevligt flyt att vara i, kunde inte känna samma här.

Läsprojekt: #minasläsinspo (Australien)

[Harald läser]

Det känns som om jag var för ung för denna, alltså att jag lite gick händelserna i förväg. Fingerspindel var höjdpunkten!