AustLit
Latest Issues
AbstractHistoryArchive Description
'Grounded Visionary: The Mystic Fictions of Gerald Murnane is a reading of Australian writer Gerald Murnane’s fiction in the light of what is known as the Perennial Philosophy, a philosophical tradition that positions itself as the mystical foundation of all the world’s religions and spiritual systems. The essential tenet of that philosophy is that at a fundamental level all of life is a unity―consciousness and world are the same thing―and that it is possible, if extremely difficult, for the discriminating individual mind to experience this wholeness. Murnane’s work can be seen not to take its lead from writings in this philosophical tradition but rather to resonate with many of them through Murnane’s unique artistic expression of his experience of the world. The crux of the argument is that beneath their yearnings for landscapes and love, Murnane’s narrators and chief characters are all in search of the essential unity that the Perennial Philosophy postulates.
'Taking its cue from Murnane’s self-description as a "technical writer," this book examines each of the author’s works in detail to reveal how structures and themes are seamlessly woven together to create artworks that shimmer with mystery while at the same time remaining thoroughly grounded in the actual.
'Grounded Visionary is the first full-length study of Gerald Murnane’s work to tackle head-on his underlying mystical sensibility and is also the first to deal comprehensively with the author’s complete fictional output from Tamarisk Row to Border Districts. This book will be of interest to all lovers of modern literature and will be of special interest to students of Australian literature and those concerned with the interface between art and spirituality.'
Source: Publisher's blurb.
Notes
-
Epigraph:
For every work of art which exists is the rhythmic articulation, in terms of any medium, of some personal vision of life. And the more entirely "original" such a vision is, the more closely—such is the ultimate paradox of things—will it be found to approximate to a re-creation, in this particular medium, of that "eternal vision" wherein all souls have their share.
— John Cowper Powys, The Complex Vision.
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
-
Brendan McNamee. Grounded Visionary: The Mystic Fictions of Gerald Murnane.
2022
single work
review
— Appears in: JASAL , vol. 22 no. 1 2022;
— Review of Grounded Visionary : The Mystic Fictions of Gerald Murnane 2019 multi chapter work criticism 'A rare task more difficult than reviewing a book by Gerald Murnane, might be reviewing a critical account encompassing most of Murnane’s oeuvre. Not that I subscribe to the regularly expressed view that Murnane is ‘difficult.’ Indeed, overall, his novels—while being admittedly daunting when encountered for the first time—are quite straightforward once the reader finds the measure of the writer’s style, tenor and range. But reviewers and critics have often struck trouble in trying to fulfil their role of describing the key elements of Murnane’s fiction to unfamiliar readers. This is because there is an undeniable intricacy to his fiction, which demands to be addressed, and in so far as possible explained or described. That ‘intricacy’ is present in the stylistic surface of Murnane’s conspicuously polished prose; in the constant flux between his fictional bedrock and the metafictional superstructure; and in the substantive content provided by his tangled thematic and imagistic obsessions. Indeed, it is the remarkable degree to which style, method and substance are interwoven that occasionally results in Murnane’s fiction perplexing even his most dedicated readers. As Brendan McNamee concedes at one point in Grounded Visionary, there is a notoriously challenging section of Murnane’s Inland that leaves him lamenting, ‘The point of which, if there is any, escapes me entirely’ (92).'(Introduction)
-
Brendan McNamee. Grounded Visionary: The Mystic Fictions of Gerald Murnane.
2022
single work
review
— Appears in: JASAL , vol. 22 no. 1 2022;
— Review of Grounded Visionary : The Mystic Fictions of Gerald Murnane 2019 multi chapter work criticism 'A rare task more difficult than reviewing a book by Gerald Murnane, might be reviewing a critical account encompassing most of Murnane’s oeuvre. Not that I subscribe to the regularly expressed view that Murnane is ‘difficult.’ Indeed, overall, his novels—while being admittedly daunting when encountered for the first time—are quite straightforward once the reader finds the measure of the writer’s style, tenor and range. But reviewers and critics have often struck trouble in trying to fulfil their role of describing the key elements of Murnane’s fiction to unfamiliar readers. This is because there is an undeniable intricacy to his fiction, which demands to be addressed, and in so far as possible explained or described. That ‘intricacy’ is present in the stylistic surface of Murnane’s conspicuously polished prose; in the constant flux between his fictional bedrock and the metafictional superstructure; and in the substantive content provided by his tangled thematic and imagistic obsessions. Indeed, it is the remarkable degree to which style, method and substance are interwoven that occasionally results in Murnane’s fiction perplexing even his most dedicated readers. As Brendan McNamee concedes at one point in Grounded Visionary, there is a notoriously challenging section of Murnane’s Inland that leaves him lamenting, ‘The point of which, if there is any, escapes me entirely’ (92).'(Introduction)
Awards
- 2021 shortlisted ASAL Awards — Walter McRae Russell Award
- Tamarisk Row 1974 single work novel
- A Season on Earth 2019 single work novel
- The Plains 1982 single work novel
- Landscape with Landscape 1985 selected work short story
- Stream System 1990 single work short story
- Barley Patch 2009 single work novel
- A History of Books 2012 selected work short story
- A Million Windows 2014 single work novel
- Border Districts 2017 single work novel
