Such Is Life
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears
Pages: Good
Markings: Previous owner
A landmark of Australian literature, Such Is Life is a richly comic and philosophically layered novel set in the outback of New South Wales and Victoria during the 1880s. Written under the pen name Tom Collins, the work chronicles a series of loosely connected episodes narrated by the bumbling yet self-important bullock-driver and government official, Tom Collins, whose rambling accounts of bush life are as unreliable as they are entertaining. With sharp satirical wit, the novel presents a vivid portrait of colonial Australian society — its itinerant workers, squatters, and sundry characters — while quietly undermining the narrator's every attempt at self-aggrandizement. Beneath its deceptively casual, digressive tone lies a sophisticated meditation on fate, chance, and the limits of human understanding, encapsulated in the novel's famous refrain borrowed from the last words of the outlaw Ned Kelly. Celebrated as one of the most distinctly Australian works ever written, it remains a rewarding and intellectually stimulating read for those willing to surrender to its unhurried, labyrinthine charm.
Author: Tom Collins
Format: Hardback
Published: 1970, Lloyd O'Neil
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears
Pages: Good
Markings: Previous owner
A landmark of Australian literature, Such Is Life is a richly comic and philosophically layered novel set in the outback of New South Wales and Victoria during the 1880s. Written under the pen name Tom Collins, the work chronicles a series of loosely connected episodes narrated by the bumbling yet self-important bullock-driver and government official, Tom Collins, whose rambling accounts of bush life are as unreliable as they are entertaining. With sharp satirical wit, the novel presents a vivid portrait of colonial Australian society — its itinerant workers, squatters, and sundry characters — while quietly undermining the narrator's every attempt at self-aggrandizement. Beneath its deceptively casual, digressive tone lies a sophisticated meditation on fate, chance, and the limits of human understanding, encapsulated in the novel's famous refrain borrowed from the last words of the outlaw Ned Kelly. Celebrated as one of the most distinctly Australian works ever written, it remains a rewarding and intellectually stimulating read for those willing to surrender to its unhurried, labyrinthine charm.