AustLit
Latest Issues
AbstractHistoryArchive Description
'In this collection of award-winning stories, Melbourne writer Maxine Beneba Clarke has given a voice to the disenfranchised, the lost, the downtrodden and the mistreated. It will challenge you, it will have you by the heartstrings. This is contemporary fiction at its finest.' (Publication summary)
Notes
-
Dedication: For Mali Langston and Maya Lou
-
Epigraph: "Let no one be fooled by the fact that we may write in English, for we intend to do unheard of things with it" –Chinua Achebe
-
In February 2020, an adaptation of Foreign Soil, written by Clarke and produced by Philippa Campey and Samantha Dinning, was announced by funding body Screen Australia. (Source: https://www.booksandpublishing.com.au/articles/2020/02/26/146428/tv-adaptations-of-cheng-clarke-books-receive-development-funding/)
Contents
- David, single work short story (p. 1-15)
- Harlem Jones, single work short story (p. 16-28)
- Hope, single work short story (p. 29-59)
- Foreign Soil, single work short story (p. 60-85)
- Shu Yi, single work short story (p. 86-100)
- Railton Road, single work short story (p. 101-121)
- Gaps in the Hickory, single work short story (p. 121-172)
- Big Islan, single work short story (p. 173-191)
- The Stilt Fishermen Of Kathaluwa, single work short story (p. 192-243)
- The Sukiyaki Book Club, single work short story (p. 244-265)
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Other Formats
- Sound recording.
- Large print.
Works about this Work
-
On Writing and Risk
2020
single work
essay
— Appears in: Meanjin , Autumn vol. 79 no. 1 2020;'Writing and risk is a topic that has preoccupied my thoughts for at least the last few years.' (Introduction)
-
Form, Frame and Allegory in Recent Transnational Short Fictions
2017
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Australian Humanities Review , November no. 62 2017;Sri Lankan Tamil Asylum Seeker on a Leaky boat finds his story interspersed with that of an Australian case worker in a wavering marriage, a ‘spoiled Emirati rich girl’ ridicules a Ukrainian sex worker online, a young Peruvian man cares for his girlfriend while concealing their relationship from her overbearing Gujarati mother. Which recent collection of short stories are these vignettes blurbing from? The answer is that each comes from a separate collection: the first from Maxine Beneba Clarke’s Foreign Soil, the second from Ali Alizadeh’s Transactions, the third from Daniel Alarcón’s War By Candlelight. Yet, in the context of these short stories and their paratexts, this list could ironically also be said to read as a cohesive blurb. Such global short stories of overlap and interconnectivity have become a staple of the transnational publishing world, with such Australian-based writers as Beneba Clarke, Alizadeh, and Nam Le winning multiple awards, making multiple bestseller lists, and joining a wider transnational phenomenon which includes such U. S. based writers as Alarcón and Jhumpa Lahiri. In this essay, I build on the work of Ken Gelder, Wenche Ommundsen, Nicholas Jose, Lachlan Brown and Marita Bullock to proximately examine the way Beneba Clark, Alizadeh and Le—the Australian writers on this list—engage with the transnational by calling attention to the ambivalent position of migrant and diasporic inscriptions of self-reference (Gelder).' (Introduction)
-
Fishermen and Little Fish : Migration and Hospitality in Maxine Beneba Clarke’s ‘The Stilt Fishermen of Kathaluwa’
2016
single work
criticism
— Appears in: Portal , vol. 13 no. 2 2016; 'In this article, we argue that Maxine Beneba Clarke’s tale ‘The Stilt Fishermen of Kathaluwa,’ in Foreign Soil (2014), is a provocative representation of migration in contemporary Australia. At a time in which the world is facing its largest migration since the Second World War and in which Australian border policy is making headlines around the world, Clarke’s tale is a powerful intervention in discourses of contemporary Australian identity and nationhood. We demonstrate that the tale is a subtle manipulation of what McCullough terms the ‘refugee narrative structure’ since it carefully undercuts the myth of a nation as a coherent narrative across time and space. By juxtaposing the tales of an illegal migrant and a volunteer case worker, and by setting the tale largely in a functioning detention centre, Clarke gives voice to the voiceless and draws parallels between individuals on different sides of the insider/outsider binary. The encounter that finally takes place between them implicates the reader very directly in discourses of contemporary migration and border policy.' -
The New Australian Literary Frontier : Writing Western Sydney
2015
single work
column
— Appears in: The Conversation , 17 February 2015; -
Young Novelists Speak with Original Voices
2015
single work
column
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 23-24 May 2015; (p. 17) The Canberra Times , 23 May 2015; (p. 13)
-
[Review] Foreign Soil
2014
single work
review
— Appears in: Books + Publishing , February vol. 93 no. 3 2014; (p. 18)
— Review of Foreign Soil 2014 selected work short story -
Tales of Oppressed Reveal Exciting Talent
2014
single work
review
— Appears in: The Sun-Herald , 27 April 2014; (p. 13)
— Review of Foreign Soil 2014 selected work short story -
Few Illusions as the Voices of the Oppressed Have Their Say
2014
single work
review
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 17 May 2014; The Age , 17 May 2014; The Canberra Times , 17 May 2014;
— Review of Foreign Soil 2014 selected work short story -
Australian Fiction
2014
single work
review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 21-22 June 2014; (p. 21)
— Review of Foreign Soil 2014 selected work short story ; Captives 2014 selected work short story ; Meatloaf in Manhattan 2014 selected work short story ; The Tribe 2014 selected work novella -
Voices
2014
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , June-July no. 362 2014; (p. 24)
— Review of Foreign Soil 2014 selected work short story -
Global Local
2014
single work
interview
— Appears in: Books + Publishing , February vol. 93 no. 3 2014; (p. 23) -
Maxine Beneba Clarke
2014
single work
column
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 3-4 May 2014; (p. 30-31) The Age , 3 May 2014; (p. 28) The Canberra Times , 3 May 2014; (p. 19) -
Stella Prize 2015 Shortlist : Three Debut Fiction Authors Nominated
2015
single work
column
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 12 March 2015; -
Stella Prize 2015: The Shortlisted Authors on the Stories behind Their Books
2015
single work
column
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 17 April 2015; -
Young Novelists Speak with Original Voices
2015
single work
column
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 23-24 May 2015; (p. 17) The Canberra Times , 23 May 2015; (p. 13)
Awards
- 2015 joint winner The Sydney Morning Herald Best Young Novelist of the Year
- 2015 shortlisted New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards — UTS Glenda Adams Award for New Writing
- 2015 shortlisted Australian Book Industry Awards (ABIA) — The Matt Richell Award for New Writer
- 2015 winner Australian Book Industry Awards (ABIA) — Australian Literary Fiction Book of the Year
- 2015 longlisted Kibble Literary Awards — Nita May Dobbie Award