Patrick White
Personal Information
Description
An Australian author, was widely regarded as a major English-language novelist of the 20th century.
Books
The Tree of Man (Modern Classics)
At the turn of the century Stan Parker takes a wife and makes a home as a small farmer in the wilderness of Australia. Amy bears his children and time brings him a procession of ordinary events - achievements, disappointments, sorrows and dreams.
Riders in the Chariot
A half-mad spinster, an aboriginal painter, a washerwoman, and a Jewish refugee--all vision seekers--struggle with the evil around them. Australian setting.
The solid mandala
Arthur and Waldo Brown were born twins and spent their childhood, their youth, middle-age and retirement together. They shared everything, even a girl, but their view of things differed. Waldo, a retired librarian, saw everything and understood little. Arthur was the fool who didn't bother to look. He understood. The book is set in Sydney, Australia in the early 20th century. The two men, sons of English immigrants, are never fully accepted by others even in their old age. They walk holding hands and this causes a stir among the local Aussies. Their somewhat sad lives are rather dull and drab.
Voss, a novel
Set in nineteenth-century Australia, "Voss" is Whiteas best-known book, a sweeping novel about a secret passion between the explorer Voss and the young orphan Laura. As Voss is tested by hardship, mutiny, and betrayal during his crossing of the brutal Australian desert, Laura awaits his return in Sydney, where she endures their months of separation as if her life were a dream and Voss the only reality. Marrying a sensitive rendering of hidden love with a stark adventure narrative, "Voss" is a novel of extraordinary power and virtuosity from a twentieth-century master.