Tale of two cities: ‘Edenglassie’ by Melissa Lucashenko

It felt quite appropriate that I was finishing this new book by Goorie author Melissa Lucashenko just as the annual public holiday of ‘Australia Day’ (also known as Invasion Day or Survival Day) dawned.

Given that the day is supposedly Australia’s national day, but is held on January 26th, the day that Governor Phillip planted the British flag on a Sydney beach and claimed the place for the British, it raises many questions of the kind also found within this novel.

When does colonisation of a place end – if it ever does?
Has the modern nation of Australia moved beyond its undeniably racist beginnings?
Who has the right to tell whose stories?
Can we see vestiges of the past in our current cities and landscapes? What lies beneath the concrete and tall buildings?
Can past hurts ever be healed?

Edenglassie was a name used briefly in the early years of colonisation for part of what is now the city of Brisbane. The novel has two timelines: a current day one, and a second narrative taking place in 1855, just a few decades after the first British convicts, guards and settlers established a settlement there.

Mulanyin is a kippa, a young Yugambeh man from the coastal region around Nerang, who has been living at Edenglassie, gone through ceremony there, fallen for a young woman, Nita, and plans to marry her, save enough money to buy a boat and return to his saltwater home. He’s received good advice from his elders, especially his Big Father, who warns him: Think hard before you pick up the things of the dagai, especially those that seem entirely pleasurable.

He is hot headed and must learn to control his impulses, especially when he sees wrongdoing against his fellows or himself. He comes to learn that while the Law imposes bonds and obligations that chafe, it also binds all Goorie people together and protects them and their civilisation. There is a lot of information given here about some of the precepts of Aboriginal culture: the importance and purpose of ceremony, the intricate rules of kinship and marriage, the careful tending and protection of natural resources.

It is effortlessly woven in with Mulanyin’s story, as is the language scattered liberally throughout. We learn that jarjums are children, jalgany is an Aboriginal woman, pullen pullen is a space set aside for ceremonial combat. There is no glossary – we get the meaning from context and repetition throughout the novel; the best way to learn.

The mid-nineteenth century was a time of increased tension and conflict in areas of Australia where European settlers were pushing further, taking more land, squeezing the First peoples out of home and livelihood. Inevitably Mulanyin is caught up in some of this with tragic consequences for his people.

His story carries through, indirectly to begin with, into the modern-day narrative. This is actually where the novel opens, in 2024, with an elderly woman known as ‘Granny Eddie Blanket’ suffering a fall in the city that sees her in hospital for most of the rest of the novel.

Granny Eddie is a formidable woman in her nineties, with a granddaughter, Winona, who is a strong activist. A young doctor, Johnny, provides care while exploring with Winona his own search for his indigenous ancestors. While a white journalist plies Granny Eddie with questions, hoping for a story on ‘Queensland’s Oldest Aboriginal Woman.’

Through sometimes heated discussion we hear debate on issues like cultural appropriation, ‘wannabe blackfellas’, government hypocrisy, does DNA make you Aboriginal? contemporary blak activism… This part of the narrative is both hard-hitting and frequently very funny, often at the same time.

Granny Eddie chastises Winona for her scorn at Dr Johnny’s attempts to get closer to indigenous ancestry:

‘I can’t come at it, Gran,’ she finally muttered. ‘It just feels all wrong. Invasive.’
“Yeah, I know it does,’ Granny nodded. ‘But believe me, girl. You’re thinking like a whitefella when ya close him out. That’s not our way. We bring people in, we bring our Mob home, and we care about em. We teach em how to behave proper way. So, you just knock orf and be nice to him!’
But what if they’re the same mob that stole our Home in the first place, Winona burned to retort. What if they’re white, Nan.
But instead, she sat down and shut her gob and stayed ning, just like a real Goorie must do when growled by her Elder.

Edenglassie p148

Last year I hear Melissa Lucashenko interviewed in which she described how it is for an Aboriginal person walking around modern Australia, aware of all the history under their feet; the ancestors’ birthplaces and burial sites, the places that once nurtured whole communities and were nurtured in return. Edenglassie is a novel that helps white Australians catch a glimpse of what was there before the dispossession and the violence and theft that came with invasion and colonisation.

And, we can get a tiny glimpse into the way that ancestors’ stories and teachings are carried though into modern day lives.

Edenglassie was published by UQP in October 2023.