Sister Kate

By Jean Bedford

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0140064966
• ISBN13: 9780140064964
• Release Date: November 1987
• Publisher: Penguin Books
• Length: 168 Pages
• Weight: 0.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 5.0" x 1.0" x 7.0"

Customer Reviews

Historical fiction, emotional truth

Descendants of the real Kate Kelly have disputed the climax of this novel, and the available documentary evidence is inconclusive. Yet Jean Bedford makes no claim to veracity. This is a work of fiction - as is much of the Kelly mythos - but the power and significance of 'Sister Kate' is the depth of genuine feeling it engenders, and the unique vision Bedford brings to material one might have thought was long exhausted. We're used to thinking of the infamous Kelly Gang members as roguish heroes, colonial villains, or as ciphers for a particular notion of the Australian national character. We rarely make the more complicated effort of trying to see them as human beings. Robert Drewe's 'Our Sunshine' is a touching step in that direction, but Bedford's novel is the more effective at rendering them as men. Surprisingly, Bedford does this by focusing on women - particularly Kate Kelly, Ned's young sister, and her relationship with the 21-year-old Joe Byrne. This is a striking premise, and one that immediately exposes the gaping hole in most accounts. But this isn't the story of the Kelly Gang through Kate's eyes, or not only that. The boys are dead by page 60. Most of the novel recounts what happens in the ruined female lives they leave behind, and the way the Kelly legend was sprouting even in Kate's own lifetime. In a remarkable scene towards the end of this novel, Kate is forced to endure a ribald pantomime in which she and her dead brothers and lover are depicted in vile caricature. If this sounds like Bedford has appropriated the Ned Kelly story and twisted it to the advancement of some revisionist or feminist cause, think again. Above all, this is a sensual novel - even erotic, in parts. What comes through most defiantly is Kate's ardent sexuality, her undying love for the murdered Joe, and the numbing addiction to which his loss might have eventually pushed her. Bedford's account of their furtive relationship and Kate's unbearable suffering in the aftermath of his death is powerfully affecting. Bedford's description of Joe's dead body, as seen by Kate, references the famous photograph of his corpse strung up on the door of the Benalla police lock-up. In this moment, Bedford does something utterly remarkable: she makes us see an iconic image from Australian history as the picture of a dead boy who was loved. If her novel achieved nothing else, that would be enough.