{"product_id":"2026100009383-secondhand-such-is-life-being-certain-extracts-from-the-diary-of-tom-collins","title":"Such Is Life: Being Certain Extracts From The Diary Of Tom Collins","description":"\u003cp\u003eEdition: First Edition\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eCondition remarks:\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBook: Good\u003cbr\u003eJacket: No dust jacket - some marks on spine and corners\u003cbr\u003ePages: Tanning and foxing\u003cbr\u003eMarkings: Previous owner\u003cbr\u003eCondition remarks: Boards worn, with moderate marks\/flecking; spine faded and dulled with bumped corners and spine ends. Foxing to prelims and text block. Previous owner's inscription on half-title. Binding slightly shaky; no loose pages.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFew novels have captured the soul of the Australian bush with such wit, audacity, and intellectual depth as Such Is Life, the landmark 1903 work penned by Joseph Furphy under the pseudonym Tom Collins. Set in the riverina districts of New South Wales and Victoria during the 1880s, the novel chronicles the episodic wanderings and philosophical musings of its narrator — a government official and self-styled sage — as he encounters squatters, bullock drivers, swagmen, and the vast, indifferent landscape that defines colonial Australia. Its tone is richly comedic yet shot through with pathos, presenting a sprawling, digressive narrative that mirrors the ungovernable nature of the continent itself.\n\nFurphy's masterwork stands as one of the great monuments of Australian literature, celebrated for its radical democratic spirit, its skewering of class pretension, and its dazzling command of irony. Written with a labyrinthine structure that rewards patient and attentive readers, the novel argues passionately for an egalitarian vision of Australian identity at a moment when the nation was itself being born. Its famously unreliable narrator — bumbling, verbose, and endearingly self-deceived — anticipates modernist techniques decades before they became fashionable. A work of inexhaustible richness, Such Is Life remains as provocative and surprising today as it was when it first rolled off the Bulletin's presses in Sydney.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Secondhand Stock","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49203102548187,"sku":"2026100009383-SECONDHAND","price":1000.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0523\/7646\/9701\/files\/6409702b-a404-4a6b-b3cf-8a8e29e9cd54.png?v=1788143718","url":"https:\/\/bookgrocer.com\/products\/2026100009383-secondhand-such-is-life-being-certain-extracts-from-the-diary-of-tom-collins","provider":"Book Grocer","version":"1.0","type":"link"}