{"product_id":"9781925410396","title":"A Writing Life: Helen Garner and Her Work","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e‘This is literary critique and biography at its finest. \u003ci\u003eAustralian Financial Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eHelen Garner is one of Australia’s most important and most admired writers. She is revered for her fearless honesty in the pursuit of her craft. \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eBut Garner also courts controversy, not least because she refuses to be constrained by the rules of literary form. She has never been afraid to write herself into her nonfiction, and many of her own experiences help to shape her fiction. But who is the ‘I’ in Helen Garner’s work? \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eBernadette Brennan’s\u003ci\u003e A Writing Life \u003c\/i\u003eis the first full-length study of Garner’s forty years of work, a literary portrait that maps all of her books against the different stages of her life. \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eBrennan has had access to previously unavailable papers in Garner’s archive, and she provides a lively and rigorous reading of the books, journals and correspondence of one of Australia’s most beloved women of letters.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e \u003cb\u003eDr Bernadette Brennan\u003c\/b\u003e is an academic and researcher in contemporary Australian writing, literature and ethics. She is the author of a number of publications, including a monograph on Brian Castro and two edited collections: \u003ci\u003eJust Words?: Australian Authors Writing for Justice\u003c\/i\u003e (UQP 2008), and \u003ci\u003eEthical Investigations: Essays on Australian Literature and Poetics \u003c\/i\u003e(Vagabond 2008). She lives in Sydney. \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e \u003ci\u003eGarner has always been a boundary-crosser. Refusing the constrictions of literary genre she has sought to write across and craft her own versions of them. She readily admits to a ‘me’ character in all her work. That character is a carefully constructed self. In her fiction, she unsettles her readers’ assumptions about protagonists by creating ‘Helen’ characters, most blatantly in ‘Little Helen’s Sunday Afternoon’, ‘Habe Dank’ and \u003c\/i\u003eThe Spare Room\u003ci\u003e. In so doing, she demonstrates the complexity of a constructed fictional self.\u003c\/i\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e‘Billed as “the first full-length study of Garner’s 40 years of work, a literary portrait that maps all of her books against the different stages of her life”. Well, who wouldn’t want to read that?’ \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eAustralian\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e ‘Bernadette Brennan’s ingenious \u003ci\u003eA Writing Life: Helen Garner and Her Work\u003c\/i\u003e, which gets around the subject’s resistance to biography by viewing her life through her writing, as Garner herself does.’ \u003cb\u003eSusan Wyndham, Best Books of 2017, \u003ci\u003eAustralian Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e‘Brennan’s depiction of Garner’s fearless approach to the very difficult subjects of \u003ci\u003eThe First Stone\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eJoe Cinque’s Consolation\u003c\/i\u003e and\u003ci\u003e This House of Grief\u003c\/i\u003e is beautifully modulated and a real triumph. She has captured and interpreted an important writer and her work beautifully.’ \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBooks + Publishing\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e ‘Brennan has produced a literary portrait that more than does its subject justice. It is not a biography; Garner was quite clear that she didn’t want that, but because Garner is so often present in her own writing, it’s inevitable that her life is reflected in the discussion of her works. This helps put her works in context, and a picture emerges of an amazing writer…Bernadette Brennan has done us all a great favour in delivering this immensely enjoyable book.’ \u003cb\u003eMark Rubbo, \u003ci\u003eReadings\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e  \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e‘Brennan is an astute and sensitive reader of Garner’s work.’ \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eBig Issue\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e ‘The writing is clear, measured, and graceful throughout…The readings of the fiction are astute and straightforward, tracing Garner’s development from the allegedly unstructured \u003ci\u003eMonkey Grip\u003c\/i\u003e, which in fact offers a formal equivalent to the push-me pull-you vagaries of love and junk, through the perfection of \u003ci\u003eThe Children’s Bach \u003c\/i\u003eand the experiments in voice and style in \u003ci\u003ePostcards from Surfers\u003c\/i\u003e, to the late-style bareness and hardness of \u003ci\u003eThe Spare Room.\u003c\/i\u003e’ \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSydney Morning Herald\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e'This book offers an illuminating discussion of Garner’s boundary crossing work. Its own magic lies in bringing elements of memoir and criticism into an absorbing conversation that begins with a rich contextualisation of Garner’s work, and extends into the literary and ethical questions with which Brennan has long been concerned.’\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eAustralian\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e‘Absorbing, informative and engaging read.’ \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eConversation\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e‘Brennan examines both assumptions by tracing Garner’s steps to becoming a full-time writer in a style that is both thoughtful and readable.’ \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eAustralian Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e‘Bernadette Brennan brings a calm eye and an easy grace to her descriptions of Garner’s life, literature and impact on Australia’s cultural and socio-political landscape…She draws a more complex picture of one of our best known and most skilled writers than we’ve enjoyed in a full-length volume before.’ \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eA Bigger Brighter World\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e‘Probably my favourite book so far [this year]. A marvellous tribute to one of Australia’s great writers.’ \u003cb\u003eMark Rubbo, \u003ci\u003eThe Best Books We’ve Read This Year (So Far) 2017, Readings\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e‘Bernadette Brennan’s first full-length study of Helen Garner’s work, \u003ci\u003eA Writing Life\u003c\/i\u003e, has inspired me to pile Garner’s books on my bedside table, and to look at each of them again with fresh eyes.’ \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe Best Books We’ve Read This Year (So Far) 2017, Readings\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e‘A remarkably shrewd study of Garner’s work knitted with a tender representation of her personal life.’ \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eMascara Literary Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e ‘Brennan performs a kind of call for literature, its criticism as well as creation.’ \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eSydney Review of Books\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e ‘You might also include academic Bernadette Brennan’s superb literary portrait of Garner, \u003ci\u003eA Writing Life: Helen Garner and Her Work\u003c\/i\u003e, which combines a close analysis of Garner’s work with illuminating insights into her life. Garner gave Brennan unprecedented access to her archives and spent long hours in conversation with her. It shows.’ \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSydney Morning Herald\u003c\/i\u003e, Can’t-Put-Down Titles for Summer\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"The Text Publishing Company","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47141111496944,"sku":"9781925410396","price":9.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9781925410396_p0.jpg?v=1763634818","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9781925410396","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}