That Deadman Dance
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''That Deadman Dance'' is the third novel by Western Australian author
Kim Scott Kim Scott (born 18 February 1957) is an Australian novelist of Aboriginal Australian ancestry. He is a descendant of the Noongar people of Western Australia. Biography Scott was born in Perth, Western Australia, in 1957, and is the eldest o ...
. It was first published in 2010 by Picador (Australia) and by Bloomsbury in the UK, US and Canada in 2012. It won the 2011 Regional
Commonwealth Writers' Prize Commonwealth Foundation has presented a number of prizes since 1987. The main award was called the Commonwealth Writers' Prize and was composed of two prizes: the Best Book Prize (overall and regional) was awarded from 1987 to 2011; the Best First ...
, the 2011
Miles Franklin Literary Award The Miles Franklin Literary Award is an annual literary prize awarded to "a novel which is of the highest literary merit and presents Australian life in any of its phases". The award was set up according to the will of Miles Franklin (1879–195 ...
, the 2011
ALS Gold Medal The Australian Literature Society Gold Medal (ALS Gold Medal) is awarded annually by the Association for the Study of Australian Literature for "an outstanding literary work in the preceding calendar year." From 1928 to 1974 it was awarded by the ...
, the 2011 Kate Challis RAKA Award, the 2011 Victorian Prize for Literature, the 2011
Victorian Premier's Literary Award The Victorian Premier's Literary Awards were created by the Victorian Government with the aim of raising the profile of contemporary creative writing and Australia's publishing industry. As of 2013, it is reportedly Australia's richest literary ...
, Vance Palmer Prize for Fiction and the 2012 NSW Premier's Literary Award Christina Stead Prize and Book of the Year.


Plot synopsis

''That Deadman Dance'' is set in the first decades of the 19th century in and around what is now
Albany, Western Australia Albany ( ; ) is a port city in the Great Southern region in the Australian state of Western Australia, southeast of Perth, the state capital. The city centre is at the northern edge of Princess Royal Harbour, which is a part of King G ...
, an area known by some historians as "the friendly frontier". The book explores the early contact between the Aboriginal Noongar people, European settlers and American whalers. The novel's hero is a young Noongar man named Bobby Wabalanginy. Clever, resourceful and eager to please, Bobby befriends the new arrivals, joining them hunting whales, tilling the land, exploring the hinterland and establishing the fledgling colony. But slowly – by design and by accident – things begin to change. Not everyone is happy with how the colony is developing. Stock mysteriously start to disappear; crops are destroyed; there are "accidents" and injuries. As the new arrivals impose ever stricter rules and regulations to keep the peace, Bobby Wabalanginy's elders decide they must respond. A friend to everyone, Bobby is forced to take sides: he must choose between the old world and the new, his ancestors and his settler friends. Inexorably, he is drawn into a series of events that will forever change not just the colony but the future of Australia. The novel is a vivid narrative seeking to recreate what an initial encounter with the white settlers might have been like from both the perspective of the coloniser and the colonised. Mainly told through the eyes of a young Aboriginal boy, it reflects some of the main concerns with colonisation and the tragic story behind a magnificent culture.


Awards and nominations

*
Commonwealth Writers' Prize Commonwealth Foundation has presented a number of prizes since 1987. The main award was called the Commonwealth Writers' Prize and was composed of two prizes: the Best Book Prize (overall and regional) was awarded from 1987 to 2011; the Best First ...
Best Book, South-east Asia and the Pacific, 2011: winner *
Miles Franklin Literary Award The Miles Franklin Literary Award is an annual literary prize awarded to "a novel which is of the highest literary merit and presents Australian life in any of its phases". The award was set up according to the will of Miles Franklin (1879–195 ...
, 2011: winner *
ALS Gold Medal The Australian Literature Society Gold Medal (ALS Gold Medal) is awarded annually by the Association for the Study of Australian Literature for "an outstanding literary work in the preceding calendar year." From 1928 to 1974 it was awarded by the ...
, 2011: winner * Kate Challis RAKA Award, 2011: winner *
Victorian Premier's Literary Award The Victorian Premier's Literary Awards were created by the Victorian Government with the aim of raising the profile of contemporary creative writing and Australia's publishing industry. As of 2013, it is reportedly Australia's richest literary ...
, Victorian Prize for Literature and Vance Palmer Prize for Fiction, 2011: winner *Indie Book Award, 2011: shortlisted *
Prime Minister's Literary Awards The Australian Prime Minister's Literary Awards (PMLA) were announced at the end of 2007 by the incoming First Rudd ministry following the 2007 election. They are administered by the Minister for the Arts.Western Australian Premier's Book Awards The Western Australian Premier's Book Awards is an annual book award provided by the Government of Western Australia, and managed by the State Library of Western Australia. History and format Annual literary awards were inaugurated by the Wes ...
, Premier's Prize and Fiction Book, 2011: winner * Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature, Fiction and Premier's prizes, 2012: winner * NSW Premier's Literary Award, Christina Stead Prize and Book of the Year, 2012: winner The Miles Franklin judges described ''That Deadman Dance'' as "a powerful and innovative fiction that shifts our sense of what an historical novel can achieve. Its language is shaped by the encounter of Noongar and Australian English, producing new writing and speech. It tells the story of the rapid destruction of Noongar people and their traditions. At the same time, there is the enchanting possibility of the birth of a new world in the strange song, dance, ceremony and language that are produced by these encounters of very different peoples."


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:That Deadman Dance 2010 Australian novels Miles Franklin Award–winning works New South Wales Premier's Prize for Fiction Award-winning works Novels set in Western Australia Books about or based in Albany, Western Australia ALS Gold Medal–winning works Noongar culture Indigenous Australian literature Australian historical novels Novels set in the 19th century