What stories tell us: ‘Finding Eliza’ by Larissa Behrendt
Euahleyai / Gamillaroi author, filmmaker, lawyer and academic, Larissa Behrendt writes both non-fiction and fiction which illuminate aspects of Australia’s history from an indigenous perspective. Her writing is always thought-provoking and perceptive, and Finding Eliza is no exception.
The book takes as its starting point the power of stories to teach, explain, and create beliefs and attitudes. She takes the well-known historical event of the 1836 shipwreck of the Sterling Castle on an island off Australia’s east coast. The only woman among a handful of survivors, Eliza was kept alive by the Butchulla people of the island called K’gari (later named by the English after the ship’s captain – and Eliza’s husband – Fraser Island). She spent several weeks there, separated from other white people, after witnessing -according to her account – her husband’s death after being speared by a Butchulla man.
This story has been told and retold many times since then, including by Eliza herself after her rescue and return to England. There have been so many versions that it is difficult to know what parts are based on real events and what has been changed, embroidered or created.
The author’s focus, however, is how the stories that grew up around Eliza’s experiences, illustrate the themes and motivations of those telling them. There are elements needed for a story to work, both for those telling and hearing the story. Eliza had to be ‘good’ and the Aboriginal people ‘bad.’ She must conform to the Victorian-era stereotype of the virtuous, middle-class, loyal wife. It was commonly believed by Europeans at the time that the Australian ‘natives’ were savage, unpredictable, and prone to cannabalism – therefore, to be feared and seen as inferior.
So it is not surprising that Eliza and the Butchulla were represented accordingly in the tales that grew up around her experiences.
The Butchulla people had their own world view and beliefs. They were not just a silent backdrop to the adventures of a white woman, nor were they an undifferentiated source of threat. But in order to provide the tension necessary in Eliza’s story, they had to be portrayed in this way. The truth is that without their assistance and care, Eliza would have most likely perished on the island before she could be rescued.
…{Eliza’s} survival of the shipwreck is not the climax of this story; it is just the beginning. The heart of her story unfolds when she makes contact with the Aboriginal people who populate this land, and it is her alleged captivity by these ‘brutal’ and ‘cannabalistic savages’ and her eventual rescue that gives her tale its compelling drama.
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The author takes this a starting point, to then explore a range of aspects of colonialism in Australia.
These include: the ‘Enlightenment’ ideals of the nineteenth century viewed alongside the dispossession and savagery of occupation and colonisation; black / white relations including sexual relations, sexual slavery and prostitution; the silence about the contribution of Aboriginal women to the colonial economy; the control over Aboriginal lives wielded by the colonists; why the trope of cannabilism held such power among whites; cultural appropriation, and how positive stereotypes can be as damaging as negative ones.
As Ms Behrendt concludes:
In… stories, we learn much more about the coloniser than we ever learn about the colonised, but by looking at them through different lenses and different perspectives we begin to appreciate the complexities and nuances of our own history.
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This is a book that made me think, review my own preconceptions about the past and the stories I grew up with. It is as relevant today as when it was first published by University of Qld Press, in 2016.


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