Peter Carey, The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith

Grace Moore (University of Otago)

Ed. by Graham Allen, University College Cork
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 9.1.1: Australian Writing and Culture.
Vol. editors: Susan Kossew (Monash University)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1994

Places

Australia (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

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The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith

(1994) is widely regarded as Peter Carey’s least successful novel to date, although this assessment may be explained by the work’s complete departure from his previous writing. Richly experimental, it abandons the well-established Australian settings which had characterized much of Carey’s work up until this point, but it is still a novel that is very much caught up with issues of nationalism and national identity, both important themes in Carey’s fiction.

Reviewers have been divided on the work’s merits, with Melissa Bellanta declaring in The API Review of Books that: “Tristan Smith is too self-conscious, too obviously invented, to really hit its own stride…Tristan Smith himself never escapes the two-dimensionality of a cartoon

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2818 words

Citation: Moore, Grace. "The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 31 October 2005 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=8031, accessed 24 April 2024.]

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